The Ghosts of a Wanderer (Being Re-Writen)
by ArizonaRanger057
Summary: A Wasteland legend, from the DC ruins to the Mojave desert, James Hardigan has seen and meet everyone: Slavers, Enclave Remnants, even Aliens, don't get me started on the aliens, but by far, this new world, it's just plain fucking weird man, like really weird (Tale of Two wastelands character, Slight AU for RWBY and Fallout (Being Re-Written)
1. Chapter 1

Hey there, TwoBears Magee here, and I am here to welcome you too 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer', This story came to me in a sudden bout of inspiration while playing Far Harbor, so I decided I would write out my insane mental rambling, and thing thing came out. It's a bit AU of RWBY and Fallout will have a few real life weapons instead of just a bunch of laser rifles and bethesda's shitty looking version of an AK *Cough*Chinese assault rifle*Cough* anywho, let's dive in.

And remember, reviews can save lives, (Well more like they make the story better, but I thought that sounded cooler.)

"Normal" - Talking/ Making Sounds

'Normal' - Thoughts

*Normal* - Radio Signals/Holotapes

[Normal] - Computer/Pip-Boy/Notes

I own nothing, if I did than their would be a Lone Wanderer in RWBY cannon.

The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 1

James 'The Wanderer' Hardigan has experienced a lot of weird situation, from being drugged by tree people, to being abducted by aliens. But it all looked like a cakewalk compared to the situation he was in now.

James wakes up with a wince of pain, his head resting on the steering wheel of the humvee he was driving not five minutes earlier. a hulking mass of pitch black fur, with white spikes all along what he assumed to be the back of the strange looking creature pinned between a dilapidated building and the front of the Humvee, the strange animal had white plates all over its body and dull red eyes that were staring lifelessly back at him through his cracked windscreen. 'Damn it, that was a gift from Sarah.' he thought glumly.

Clearly whatever this thing was, it was dead, but if James's time in the wasteland taught him anything, It was that you could never be too sure. Opening the driver door with a grunt, and stretching out his back. Hearing a few satisfying pops resonante from his back, he reach for his Pip-Boy and, with a flash of blue light, equipped his Reilly's Rangers T-51b Winterized Power Armor, and a .45 Auto Handgun.

Shifting his focus to the hulking black and white mass on the hood of his wrecked vehicle. James saulters over and Pointed the end of the handgun to the unarmored temple of the creature, and with a deafening crack, slammed a round home into the creature's head, letting pitch black blood and brain matter run freely onto the hood.

Now with one problem solved James wanted something to fill the eerily quiet ruined air street with music, James Looks down at his Pip-Boy, but paused and furrowed his brow at a strange message that popped up on the dull blue screen.

[ERROR - CANNOT FIND ROBCO OR VAULT-TECH SATELLITES - PLEASE CALL SERVICE CENTER FOR ASSISTANCE AT 1-800-VAULT-TECH - ERROR]

"Thats weird, I've never seen that before." he said quietly to himself, narrowing his eyes in curiosity. He dismissed the error and flipped to the Radio tab in his Pip-Boy, only to find a single radio signal.

"Vale News Radio? What the hell is Vale? Is it some sort of new faction?" he asked himself in confusion, James sat in the driver's seat of the humvee, leaving the door open and hanging his legs out the side, selecting the strange signal. It sounded awfully familiar to a certain DJ's radio station back in the DC ruins.

*Heyyy~ Vale~, it's me~, DJ Dogg~, your favorite disk jockey in all of Vale, and i'm here with a bit of news for all of ya. First off, It seems it's that time of year again, as a large congregations of colorful and armed teenagers are boarding airships this afternoon at the Vale International Airport on their way to Beacon Academy, yup thats right boys and girls, the big man Ozpin has gotta have a new record for most new hunters and huntresses in training this year or something, but onto other news, cooler news, the headline? The End Is Nigh?! Last week we had a calle-*

James quickly deselected the station, now silently sobbing.

"Its Galaxy New Radio all over again, he even sounds like Three Dog." James whimpered between sobs, 'What did I do to deserve this' James flips to the misc category in his Pip-Boy and selects a blue holotape labeled 'Old World Blues - The Best Of 2077' Early in his journeys, James had grown so tired of Three Dogs voice that he'd spent a little over 3000 caps just so he wouldn't have to listen to his god damned voice while traveling through the radioactive hell hole he called home.

*I Don't want to set the world on fire~ *

James immediately wiped the exaggerated tear from his face and smiled, this was his favorite song after all. He moves towards the back of the Humvee to scavenge whatever he could from the now wrecked Humvee 'I mean it's not like I can drive it anymore, I might as well take everything that isn't bolted down.'

*One badass cinematic looting montage later*

After fiddling with a few buttons on his Pip-Boy, the two laser rifles and three ammo boxes full of assorted ammunition he had found were digitized into his inventory with a bright flash of blue. Honestly, when he had found out he could change the color in the setting of his Pip-Boy, he essentially cried and hugged Stanley for like five minutes, 'Damn that default green fucking hurt my eyes,' he thought to himself, shaking his head again, he didn't usually get off track like this.

"Well I guess it's back to hiking the lonely road once again" he said to himself, nodding his head in approval, it had been a long time since he had flown solo and he was pretty excited, and at the moment his surroundings looked new, but they also looked insanely dull, 'why is everything so grey', it almost felt the same as when he first set foot in the heart of the DC Ruins only this place somehow felt shittier, and now that he was focusing on his surroundings, it was almost as if he had just walked into said ruins without colorvision.

To James, it felt almost as if he was being watched by something, as if inside every dark shadow, building, and alleyway, he was being watched. But he couldn't quite figure out what it was, it unnerved him and made him put up his guard.

'This place is freaking me the fuck out man, I don't know what it is, but I don't like it.' James thought to himself, walking down the rubble strewn street he looked back ahead of him and spotted something rounding a corner that, if he didn't have a robo heart, would have made it skip a beat.

Normally, James wouldn't have this reaction, in the wasteland it was almost as if he could sense if their was anyone nearby, but he never felt this thing, it looked a lot like a Deathclaw, only a little shorter, and without the horns or the foot long claws they get their names from. It was also covered in pitch black fur, white and red plates, and spikes, just as the creature that was on his Humvee had, but instead of the dull lifeless red of the other creatures eyes, this ones were glowing a bright and deadly crimson.

The creature spotted James, and let out a howl reminiscent of a Deathclaw Matriarch calling her pack, so it wasn't much of a surprise when a small hoard of creatures climbed out of every shadowed place surrounding him. All of the creatures looked exactly the same at the first one, only a couple of feet shorter, and gave off less of a death metal vibe judging from the smaller number of spikes on their backs. All of said creatures started advancing on James's possession, encircling him, and giving off short howls and snarls. Not a single one came within a couple of meters of him, leaving a gap in front of him for the larger creature of the group to advance forward and close the gap, 'most likely the alpha' James thought, eyes still gazing intently at it, for a few moments the large creature and James were just standing still, staring at each other. The large black and white creature slowly kited the opposite side of the writhing black ring.

Almost as if an invisible bell had rung, the creature bolted toward him, brandishing short but razor sharp looking claws, causing James to sidestep to the left and spot an opening in the creatures defence, and with a flash of blue he drew a long serrated blade crackling with electricity, and slashed the unarmored side of the creature. Causing it to let out a howl of pain in response, its muscles tightening and causing it to lose balance.

Quickly righting itself, the creature spun around with a wide horizontal slash that was easily dodged. James countered with a quick punch, the bone mask cracked to bits, causing bone fragments too pop both of its bright red eyes like grapes.

Now holding its face and writhing in pain on the ground James moved to finish the fight.

"Clearly I overestimated you," he says walking closer to the creature until he was almost face to face with the whimpering mass of black, white, and red. With a final assault however, the creature sent out a weak swipe attempting to take The Wanderer with it. Only for it to be easily swatted away.

"Ya know, I honestly thought you would give me a decent challenge with your size, all spiky and shit, but you're nothing but an overgrown molerat." he said loudly,trying too intimidate the other creatures, little did he know their was only one thing that was really listening.

Beacon Academy - Headmaster Ozpin's Office

"Are you sure we shouldn't send someone to investigate Headmaster? What if it's the White Fang?" said a blond woman holding a riding crop and a large scroll, watching a live feed from one of Beacon Academy's drones. Currently on screen was what looked like one of the original prototypes for the Atlesian Knights, mercilessly killing off a pack of Beowulfs in the middle of the deserted streets of Mt. Glenn.

"Glenda, I already contacted James, and he says he has no knowledge of any Atlesian personnel in the Vale area, however, you and I both know how James loves to play spy." Ozpin sighed, taking a long sip from his mug. "I want to know what this thing is, and I want to know before sundown Glenda, do you understand?" Glynda noded as he finished. Taking another sip, 'I have a feeling the plan will need some adjustments soon.'

Bullhead enroute to Mt. Glenn - A Ten Minutes Later

"Ma'am, we will be landing soon, are you sure you want us to guard the bullhead, I can send Johnson with you at least." came a muscular voice over the Bullhead's comm system. The owner of the voice belonging to none other than First Sergeant Jim McCoy, the former Atlesian Special Forces Officer turned Head of Beacon Security, he was a tall man, broad shoulders, and yellow accents on his armor denoting him as Security personnel along with the Beacon Academy emblem on his patrol cap.

"Do not worry Sergeant, I will be fine, just be sure to set up a perimeter and keep the Bullhead safe." Glenda replied as the Bullhead landed with a bounce in a destroyed intersection with burnt out cars and knocked over street lights, skeletons littered the ground as a grim reminder of the failure of Mt. Glenn.

"If you insist Ma'am, just be quick, the pilot said the landing might have attracted a few Goliaths." McCoy said, pulling his assault rifle from his back and gesturing to his squad to get out and set up defensive positions. As Glenda started her trek towards the strange machine roaming around Mt. Glenn.

Some road in the middle of Mt. Glenn

James was having a bad day, he thought that maybe, just maybe, these creatures would pose a challenge to him, but instead his sword just ripped through them like a hot knife through butter. Their armor was weak, and they were pretty stupid too. It was like fighting off a bunch of giant kittens with a Fatman. Any time they were successful in hitting him, it would just glance off of his armor with a shower of sparks.

"Jesus, you guys are pathetic, it's almost insulting how weak you guys are." James said, laughing and crushing one of the smaller Deathclaw like creatures heads between his fingers, coating the white armored hands in black blood and specks of bone.

Going into a more relaxed posture James looks around him to find the first creature dissolving into the air, along with a few of his earlier kills. "Holy shit, the brains at Big MT. would LOVE this I gotta get some before-" the distinct sound of rifle fire quickly distracted James, making him completely forget his train of thought.

"Ooo, Sounds kinda like a laser rifle, lets go and visit, maybe I can get some loot, maybe a new gun, heh, that would be cool." James said, breaking out into a sprint in the direction of the gunfire. Mind juggling schematics of laser assault rifles would look like 'Oooo, maybe I can make, like, a plasma assault rifle, or, or a plasma ROCKET LAUNCHER!' He thought while running, completely oblivious to the wall he was barreling towards.

Slamming into the decaying and bullet riddled wall with the assistance of his Power Armor, James broke a man sized hole in the wall into an intersection. Flinging chunks of cinder blocks onto the destroyed roadway, and falling face first onto the cracked asphalt, he just stayed that way, contemplating his life and such. Until he heard the telltale sound charging handles being locked into place. 'well Shit' was all james could think.

"Drop your weapons and put your hands on your head." he heard a strong voice yell in a tone that commanded respect. It reminded James of Paladin Gunny, The Citadels resident Drill Sergeant.

"Hey there Buddy, calm down, no need to make any hasty assumptions, I just heard gunfire and though somebody could use a hand, that's all." James lied hoisting himself up into a standing position, he was realling kinda hoping to loot them to be honest, James dwarfed the five men pointing strange rifles at him, all of them in the same pristine white combat armor with yellow accents, 'Wow, they are WAY too clean and organized for a bunch of wastelanders.' James thought to himself. His eyes finally resting on a significantly taller individual, only a couple of inches shorter than James's suit of Power Armor with red hair and a scar running down his left eye, and wearing a patrol cap, denoting him as the leader of the small troop of unknown men.

"The names James Hardigan, it's nice to meetcha Mr.?" James asked, sticking his hand out for the tall man to shake. He hesitated a moment, taking in the newcomer. A large suit of white heavy looking armor, it looked battle hardened, dents and scratches all over the armor, it made his armor look like it was fresh out of the factory. The helmet had a thin dark 'T' shaped visor and tubes coming out of the helmets 'mouth'. The armor had a four leaf clover with crossed cutlasses stenciled of the right side of the breast plate with the words 'Reilly's Rangers' written underneath.

"McCoy, First Sergeant Jim McCoy, nice to meet y-" Jim's hand was suddenly grabbed and forcefully yanked towards the hulking mass of white armor, putting him into a choke hold, taking extra care to not accidentally snap his neck and resting the barrel of his .45 to McCoy's temple. Surprising the other soldiers present, making them raise their weapons towards James.

"You Enclave sons of bitches, you can't trick me, nobody else uses that ranking system anymore except you guys. Now tell me where the hell your base is so I can rid this place of your filth just like I did in DC." James snarled, hate and anger in his voice. 'How did the Enclave get here. I thought I destroyed them already, sure they scattered, but the Brotherhood and I have been hunting them down. How are they still alive?' James thought, his mind going a million miles a minute.

"Enclave? Buddy you're making no sense, were Beacon's Private Security, we don't even know what the hell this 'Enclave' is man. Just let the Sarge go and we can talk this out like civilized adults." calmly said one of the men in the squad, "Just let the sarge go man." he repeated.

"You give me a good reason right now not to blast your 'Sarge's' head off right now." James snarled again, seething in anger and hate towards what he thought were Enclave troops.

"I don't think that will be necessary Mr. Hardigan, I assure you that they are just my escort here in order to look for you." Said female voice behind James, causing James to deselect his bulky power armor in favor of his Merc Grunt Outfit with a heavily modified chest piece salvaged from Desert Ranger armor he found in a cave in the sorrows camp in Zion Canyon, the switch causing a bright blue flash, temporarily blinding all occupants of the street except James. By teh time their eyes adjusted from the flash, James was gone.

"Where'd he go? Did he run away?" asked one of the members of the squad quickly, scanning the area with his rifle.

"Why are you looking for me, and if you're not with the Enclave than just who are you, your well trained judging from how your boys move, and those uniforms are way too clean for just a bunch of random raiders, are your from the west or something?" James asks from behind a concrete traffic divider to the right, dematerializing several grenades and his M1 Carbine while speaking.

"They are members of the Private Security Firm that Beacon employs, they are all ex-military, mostly from Atlas, I am Glynda Goodwitch, a Professor at Beacon, the Headmaster sent me out to retrieve you so that he could you and ask you a few question." Glynda explained, her demeanor screaming 'No nonsense'.

"And what happens after I meet with this so called 'Headmaster'? He need a job done or something?" James said doubtfully, but he kinda needed money, he had just spent all of his savings on 'Victory Booze'.

"If you decide to meet him, we will go from there, if you have any requests, I am sure the Headmaster will fulfill them in order to meet you in person, and he may have a job offering for you." Glynda said, obviously lying through her teeth at the last part, she didn't see Ozpin actually hiring him, she could tell he was dangerous, and Ozpin only hired straight from a trusted source in an Atlas PMC, not just random thugs off the street.

"I only have two requests, wait, three, three requests." James says, holding up three fingers over the cover for them too see.

"One, I want one of those badass looking guns" he said pointing at the rifle in McCoy's hands as if he wasn't hiding behind a concrete mini-wall.

"Two, I want Materials and tools along with a place to work," James said without hesitation, pointing his finger in the air.

"And Three, I want to get my Humvee hauled wherever were going." James finished, waiting for the woman's, only to receive a different voice

"Whats a Hum-vee?" the man's voice asked, cracking as it said 'Humvee'

"What's your name?" James asked his eye twitching in annoyance at the interruption and pointing towards the man from over the cover, felt as if they were talking to a sock puppet only without the sock.

"My names Bobby, how does my name matter in all of this?" the newly dubbed 'Bobby' asked confusion evident in his tone.

"Bobby, If you butt in on my business, ONE MORE, GODDAMN TIME, I WILL RIP YOUR CAHONES OFF, AND PUT EM IN MOTOR OIL, YOU GOT ME, 'BOBBY'." James yelled at the top of his lungs, making a ripping gesture with his free hand from behind cover and causing Bobby to jump backwards in surprise.

"OK, back to what I was saying, I would really appreciate it if you would bring my Humvee too, I kinda may have crashed it into a giant bear looking motherfucker, and it kinda has an Anti-Infantry HMG mounted on it, and I would really like to not lose it, I would have taken it with me, but~, Sarah said, and I quote, 'James if you use that gun with your bare hands you might hurt yourself', so long story short, she welded it to the chassis." James ranted, making a strangely feminine voice when quoting Sarah and making finger quotes from behind the divider.

Everyone present just stood their, confused as fuck, this man, who they have been having an entire conversation from behind a concrete half-wall, using his hand like a puppet, and still somehow scaring the shit out of half the people present, It was just a bizarre situation.

"I - I belive that can be accomplished Mr, Hardigan, Now please come out from there, I can't very well take you to the Headmaster if you're hiding behind a divider." Glynda said nervously, silently questioning the man's sanity.

"Ma'am, I only have one question." James stated, genuine curiosity written on his face and seriousness in his voice.

"Yes Mr. Hardigan?" Glynda answered, surprised at his serious tone.

"Will there be a mini-bar on the flight? Because seriously, I need a drink right now, today has just been one of those days." James replys, a shit eating grin forming on his face as he heard a quiet chuckle emanated from where he assumed McCoy was standing.

"No, no there will not be a mini-bar." Glynda said, facepalming and moving to board the Bullhead, slightly perturbed at how immature Beacon's head of security was being.

"Oh, well that's alright, because I brought my own~" James finished in a fit of laughter rising from behind his 'puppet stage', a white bottle from monty knows where in both his hands.

"Hey, hows about repaying me for putting me in a hold, by giving me some of that there liquid gold you got there?" McCoy asked, chuckling and eyeing the bottle as soon as James entered the VTOL as it took off for Beacon.

"I don't know gramps, I only have about twenty bottles vodka, and I don't like wasting good vodka." James explained, taking a long swig from the bottle and putting on a sly grin.

"Oh ho ho, kid, when I was in the Atlas Spec Ops Division, we had some of the best Atlesian liquor at our disposal, being a badass in the military got you the good stuff, and oh boy did we drink, but that's not the point, give me a swig, I can handle everything you have to throw at me." McCoy exclaimed, striking a dramatic pose and laughing with a cocky smile on his face.

"Whatever you say gramps." James said chuckling and handing him the unmarked white bottle, his sly expression screaming 'You're fucked' the only person too not notice it being McCoy.

"Thats right, come to papa." McCoy coed to the bottle, lifting it up and taking a good long gulp of the strong liquor. He immediately regretting it as he did a spit take, a strong burn going down his Esophagus.

"GAHH - what the FUCK is in that." McCoy choughed, holding his throat, the action eliciting a couple of laughs throughout the crew compartment of the Bullhead, sure, he had had a lot of alcohol in his life, and it all gave off a dull warmth going down, but this felt as if he was swallowing fire!

"Oh, did papa get a little too cocky with his "Liquid Gold'?" James teased with a voice one would typically use with small children.

"If you can't handle even a single sip of my alcohol oh great 'God of Liquor', than I think you should re-evaluate your life choices gramps." James joked, plucking the bottle out of McCoy's hands and chugging the bottle down, and moving to throw the empty bottle out of the open troop doors and down towards the landscape speeding by, only instead of throwing the bottle, it just fell too the floor, rolling out of the doors, as the landscape rolling by was no longer a ruined city.

It was a forest. An honest to god forest!

The Wanderer's jaw dropped, eyes widening. Causing him to sit down, his legs hanging out the side of Bullhead and subconsciously flipping a switch back and forth on his Pip-Boy with his other hand, a nervous habit as of late that only happened when he was deep in thought, black-out-drunk, or completely speechless.

And he was almost never any of those things.

"Where the hell am I…" James whispered barely audible over the rushing wind passing by the large door, his eyes glued to the sight of the rolling forest. Shure he had been to Oasis, but they had nothing on this place, this place was fucking Gorgeous.

"Were flying over The Emerald Forest Mr. Hardigan, is there a problem?" Glynda said, looking towards the man staring outside of the Bullhead, she couldn't see his face, but she could tell he was awestruck.

"Wow, I am totally out of my element." James said, turning his head and giving the other occupants of the VTOL a chuckle. 'I have no idea where I am, what the hell am I even gonna do?' He thought to himself, until the perfect plan came into his head.

'Ooo, I know, lets fuck some shit up!' He thought excitedly

A/N

And fucking shit up is just what you'll do James.

Alright, what did you think boys and girls, I want this story to be mainly light hearted and humorous, but there will be a few tear jerker moments too, (if I can write them right), anyways, tell me what you guys though. Did I write the action scene with too much description? or too little? Do the characters seem interesting and relatable in some aspect? That sort of thing, shoot me a Review or a PM if you want to ask questions and such. I love you all. Thanks for reading, and I hope you'll tune in for the next (hopefully) exciting chapter of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer'

P.S. If you find my reference, shoot me a PM and you'll get an internet cookie! YAY! (or maybe a shout out, idk yet)


	2. Character Sheet

**A/N**

 **There was a request for the character sheet for James, so here it is, I left out some stuff in the inventory so that some parts of the story won't be spoiled, and I might add some stuff later on, if I do, i'll tell you guys the sheet has been updated. The next chapter is about halfway done as of now, so you can expect it some time by the end of this weekend hopefuly.**

 **Remember to send in feedback and your opinion so that I can improve the story, thank you all of reading. PM me if I missed anything important.**

 **Love you all, TwoBearsMagee.**

James ' _The Wanderer'_ Hardigan

Sex - Male

Age - 17

DOB - Jan - 21 - 2277

Affiliation

Good - Reilly's Rangers, Brotherhood of Steel, The Boomers

Bad - Enclave, Caesar's Legion, Great Khans

Mehh - NCR, Followers of the Apocalypse

Special

S - 10

P - 10

E - 8

C - 10

I - 9

A - 10

L - 5

 _ **Traits**_

Skilled / Trigger Discipline

 _ **Perks**_ (From primarily fallout NV because I like those perks the best.)

 _Toughness_ \- + 3 DT Permanently

 _Demolitions Expert_ \- + 20% Damage with Explosives

 _Hand Loader_ \- When using Guns, you are twice as likely to recover cases and hulls. You also have all hand load recipes unlocked at any reloading benches.

 _Vigilant Recycler_ \- When using Energy Weapons, you are twice as likely to recover drained ammunition. You also have more efficient recycling recipes available at workbenches.

 _Shotgun Surgeon_ \- When using shotguns, regardless of ammunition used, you ignore an additional 10 points of a target's Damage Threshold.

 _Strong Back_ \- + 50 Carry weight

 _Mister Sandman_ \- Can instantly kill a sleeping non-player character, and earn bonus XP when doing so.

 _Robotics Expert_ \- + 25% Damage against robots. When in sneak mode, can deactivate robots.

 _Silent Running_ \- Running no longer factors into a successful sneak attempt.

 _Sniper_ \- + 25% more likely to hit a target's head in VATS

 _Jurry Rigged_ \- Repair gear with a roughly similar weapon.

 _Light step_ \- You no longer set off traps.

 _Implant M-5_ \- + 20% too you're crouched movement speed.

 _Camarader-E_ ( rank 5) - + 2 DT, +5% laser weapon damage, +5% VATS hit chance.

 _ **Inventory**_

 **Weapons** \- Prototype AE4 laser rifle, Paciencia (Scope and bipod), .45 Auto pistol (optional silencer), M1 Carbine (Paratrooper wire stock), .22 Silenced SMG, YCS/186 Gauss rifle, Q-35 Matter Modulator, x2 Laser rifles (scavenged from Humvee) Christine's COS Sniper rifle, Jingwei's Shock Sword.

 **Apparel** \- Merc Grunt Combat Armor (Yup, I made it up, it's the Desert Ranger [Honest hearts DLC] vest from under the trench coat on over the Merc Grunt Outfit, the vest has the Reilly's Rangers emblem it), T-51b power armor (I like how the power armor is in fallout 4, but I wanted it to still be atomizable, so I made it as such, he will almost never do it due to weight though),

 **Aid** \- Stimpak x25, MedX x10, RadAway x25, RadX x25, Stealthboy x10, Deathclaw Steaks x5, Cateye x2, Purified water x3, Buffout x2, Nuka-Cola x10 +1 Quantum, x5 Mentats, Anti-venom x5, Bobbie Pin x99 (I'm not adding misc, too much stuff that will ruin the story)


	3. Chapter 2

**A/N**

 **Hey there boys and girls, welcome back to 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer', today's chapter consists of, Meeting Ozpin and stuff, YAY, Hope you all like it.**

 **Remember to send in your thoughts, Reviews, and any mistakes I may have missed in post.**

 **Remember boys and girls, I love you all.**

 **Enjoy**

"Normal" - Talking/ Making Sounds

'Normal' - Thoughts

*Normal* - Radio Signals/Holotapes

[Normal] - Computer/Pip-Boy messages/Notes

I own nothing sadly.

 **The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 2**

Beacon Academy - Headmaster Ozpin's Office

Ozpin was not having a very good day. His coffee was cold, he was short staffed and due to losing contact with the Atlas PMC he wasn't able to find a replacement Security member in time for the next school year, and there was an absolutely enormous influx of student this year. Then, worst of all, Ironwood was breathing down his neck for, 'Intel' as he called it, on the person running around Mt. Glenn. Ozpin looked at the large scroll in his hands, the footage of a large white suit of armor holding his head of security in a choke hold, than flashing a bright blue, only for him to barely spot a young man with jet black hair diving behind a traffic divider in a blur of beige and brown.

Ozpin just hummed to himself at the footage, somehow this young man had been able to make the large suit of white armor disappear in a flash. ' _Just who is this young man?_ ' Ozpin thought to himself, a ding from the elevator jolting him from his though as the doors opened and revealed Glynda Goodwitch, his second in command, and young man, no older than seventeen, two circular scars on his face, accompanied by a long vertical scar going over his left cheek.

"Headmaster Ozpin, this is James Hardigan, the young man you wished to meet." Glynda said, gesturing to the youth, who just nodded to her in thanks.

"Hello Mr. Hardigan, I am Headmaster Ozpin, and I wished to meet with you after discovering you fighting off Grimm in Mt. Glenn so easily, it seemed you are very adept in combat, may I ask where you learned to fight so well?" Ozpin asked, gesturing to footage of James fighting the Beowulf pack, seemingly not even trying.

"Nice too meet you Ozzy, and I learned to fight from a lot of people, Mainly the Brotherhood of Steel, some Rangers from the New California Republic taught me a bit of CQC team tactics, although i'm on rocky terms with the NCR at best as of late." James stated remembering the last time he was in NCR territory ' _Ahh, good times_ ', most of the vocabulary he had used blowing right over Glynda and Ozpin's heads.

"Excuse me Mr. Hardigan, What is this Brotherhood of Steel you mentioned, I don't believe I am familiar with the group." Ozpin said, taking a sip of his cold coffee, looking inside the mug in slight irritation.

"You haven't head of the Brotherhood of Steel, ya know, big guys in Power Armor and laser rifles going all 'Ugh get out of here wastelander' and shit? You seriously have NEVER heard of the Brotherhood?" James ranted, using a deep and gravelly voice when quoting the Citadel Gatekeeper, and flailing his arms about as if he was having a seizure.

"Mr. Hardigan, do not use such profanity in the presents of your elders!" Glynda chastised, James just giving her a glare that spoke, ' _Seriously, you just pulled that card._ '

"OK MOM, Jesus, can't have a little fun anywhere I guess, always gotta get shot down." James whispered to himself sarcastically, barely loud enough for himself too hear.

"Mr. Hardigan, Could you please enlighten us as too where you lived previously?" Ozpin asked, already opening a file for the young man without him noticing.

"Vault 101, born and raised." James said, a large happy smile on his face as he put his hands on his hips and struck a pose.

"And how old are you exactly?" Ozpin asked, barely hiding a smirk as he jotted down the information into a file labeled 'Sucker'

"I'm seventeen, what's even the point of all these question Ozzy, I thought there might be a job offer, that's the only reason I followed tits magee over there." James said, sticking his hands in his pockets and shoving a thumb in Glynda's direction. Causing her eye to twitch, and her face to glowing red in anger, as she brought her riding crop to bear. Only to be stopped by a glare from the Headmaster.

"All in due time Mr. Hardigan, now what is your full name, and the full name of your parents please?" Ozpin asked, feigning innocence in his voice.

"Umm, Ok? I'm James 'The Wanderer' Hardigan Jr., my father was James Hardigan Senior, and my mother was Catherine Lynn Hardigan." James said quickly, masking a light tinge of sadness every time he said 'was' when referring to his parent, making Ozpin internally cringing, and Glynda's gaze to soften towards James. Which was of course he ignored as he kept a bright smile on his face.

"Alright Mr. Hardigan, how would you like to work here at Beacon Academy as security staff and assistant combat instructor for Glynda here?" Ozpin asked, leaning in and gesturing towards Glynda before clasping his hands together.

"Will I get a place to work in private, preferable a secluded building, maybe an abandoned one or something, along with an unlimited supply of liquor, free food, all the tools and materials I will ever need, my Humvee, and a couple of your cool looking guns, Oh, and I almost forgot, I want a pony." James said, simply listing out his demands and counting the number on his hands. Holding them out for to Ozpin with a shit eating grin on his face.

"All employees get all of those thing, plus free dental, of course not the pony, however we do have a small bar, you don't think us teachers can't have fun either do you?." Ozpin said jokingly, watching Glynda's face morph from surprised at how easily he had offered the job too James, too bright red with embarrassment when he referred to the staff's monthly 'relaxation' partys.

"Well than Ozzy, I think you have yourself a new employee!" James exclaimed, striding up too Ozpin's desk and sticking his hand to finalize the employment. Which was accepted with a firm shake

"Alright James, all we need to do now is get you a yellow level security badge and some newer armor and you can start work right away." Ozpin said, gesturing to his own yellow badge on his desk and James's old looking armor. Only causing James to glare at his new employer, a hurt look on his face.

"Wohohoho, hold your proverbial horse's their Ozzy, i'm all good and ready for the super secret open every door keycard, but I keep my own armor, it's tougher than your stuff by, well, a lot." James stated, gesturing to himself from head to toe.

"James, I highly doubt your antique armor is stronger than Grade A+ Valeian Steel combat armor." Ozpin said, a slight smug look on his face as he gestured to the guard near the elevator, making James smirk.

"Ozzy, Ozzy, Ozzy, this is a lightweight titanium alloy, made specifically to beat the best heavy armor out their." James bragged, gesturing to his desert ranger vest.

And surprising everyone as he pulled out a large handgun and proceeded to shot himself in the gut, causing him to double over in pain, and falling to his knees.

"Mr. Hardiagn! Are you alright?! What in the world possessed you to do tha-" Glynda shouted running too James and kneeling besides him, putting her hand on his back, only to be temporarily blinded by a bright flash, she rubbed the stars out of her eyes and looking at James laying on his back cradling a camera and laughing his ass off.

"Hahaha, I totally got you, Your face, it was FUCKING PRICELESS!" James exclaimed, gasping for air and jabbing his finger at Glynda with every syllable that came out of his mouth. Kicking his legs up and down in amusement. As Glynda's eye twitched again and her face went red with anger and embarrassment.

"James, would you please come here for a moment." Ozpin said sternly, glaring at James. Glynda just put on a smug smile and walking back next to Ozpin.

"Yes Ozzy Sir?" James asked with a mock salute, still chuckling slightly.

"How much for a copy of that picture?" Ozpin asked, pulling out his wallet, a mischievous glint in his eyes. Causing Glynda's eyes to widen in fear.

"Well Ozzy, as my new employer i'll give you a good deal, 2000 Caps for the original copy." James said, a large smile on his face, which was only meet with a confused glance from Ozpin.

"Caps? Like bottle caps?" Ozpin asked skeptically, raising an eyebrow at James.

"Yea like bottle caps, what have you been doin' Ozzy, living under a rock." James Joked, his hands out ready to accept payment.

"Well alright James, i'll have 2000 caps in your quarters by the end of the day." Ozpin stated smoothly, playing off his confusion and taking the photo, placing it in one of his drawers.

"Well than, I think that has been enough excitement for one day, Mr. Hardigan hear is your scroll, you will be giving a key to the old student vehicle repair garage as it is now abandoned due to no student owning vehicles, you will also be given one of the extra teacher's quarters, we will have your Humvee here within the week, and as security staff you can always just withdraw a couple of rifles from the armory to tinker with, within reason of course." Ozpin said, handing James a scroll and a map too the student garage, giving him a stern glare when referring to the armory, and shooing him towards the elevator, along with the guard that was standing next to it.

"If you need anything do not hesitate to call us, the scroll has mine, Glynda's, and Sergeant McCoy's numbers pre-programmed into it." Ozpin yelled as the elevator doors closed, only to get a thumbs up as a response, which was subsequently crushed by the doors with a yelp as it was yanked back.

"Why, in all the name of all that is Monty, did you hire that, that, that BRUTE!" Glynda complained, losing her temper slightly.

"He seems unique, and he could be of use if we want everything is to go as planned, an ace up our sleeves if you will Glynda." Ozpin responded, staring at where James had just been a few moments ago, thinking deeply.

"I am more interested in the strange computer on his wrist if I am too be honest, it looks remarkably similar, don't you think?" Ozpin asked, looking towards Glynda, who responded with a nod.

"Keep an eye on him at all times Glynda, if he can open it, than he will be the king among pawns." Ozpin said cryptically, Glynda nodded simply agreeing with the Headmaster.

"I hope so." Glynda said simply, clasping her hands together and doing an about face too look out onto the grounds of the academy.

Unknown Place - Unknown Time

"Sir, the stranger in power armor has been intercepted by a local Beacon Bullhead." A young brown haired man in an officer's uniform said, tapping away at the screen in front of him.

The dark room was filled with the tapping of keyboards and officers speaking to each other.

"Damn, recall the strike team. Have we regained contact with the base in Mt. Glenn yet?" An old man with an eagle on the collar of his coat said angrily, the eagle denoting him as a colonel.

"Yes sir, they say he isn't one of theirs, and that they have no idea where he got the armor. Maby he's just some local who got into one of our stashes?" The young man turned to look at his commanding officer, seeing the aged man, with short white hair and long trench coat, holding his chin deep in thought.

"No, he they wouldn't have the proper training…" The Colonel trailed off, deep in thought of recent events.

"Can it have anything to do with the large energy spike in that area?" The colonel asked the officer, hoping it was just a coincidence.

"Yes sir, sensors indicate that there are still trace reading on the stranger sir." The young man stated, his eyes widening for a moment as he zoomed into the source of the strange reading.

"Umm, Sir? I think you should, come and see this." The officer said nervously, unable to take his eyes off of the screen.

"What is it son, can't you see i'm busy, thinking…." The Colonel trailed off, as soon as he looked at the screen.

On screen was a Humvee, boring the sword, gears, and wings of the Brotherhood of Steel.

"It's the Brotherhood, their here, how did they get here." the officer said in disbelief, fear rising in the pit of his stomach.

The Colonel ran too a console on a wall across the room and picked up a phone in a panic.

"This is Sensor Base Epsilon, confirmation code 027421, get me the President NOW! It's a Code Silver Emergency. I repeat, Code Silver Emergency." The colonel yelled frantically into the phone.

A voice from the other side of the phone answered, static almost cutting out the voice completely.

"A Code Silver? You can't mean that-" the voice was cut off by the voice.

"Command, There is a Brotherhood threat here on Remnant." The Colonel finished, his voice cracking and fear rising in his chest.

 **A/N**

 **AWWW SNAP,**

 **I hope you all like this chapter, shorter than the last, but it's not about the size of the chapter, it's about how you write in it, right? Is that how that saying goes, Ahh, I don't fucking know, good enough for me.**

 **Anyhow, James is still a bit of an asshole, and Ozpin's a sneaky bastard. Still now RWBY cast yet, but all in due time, I gotta figure out how I want them to be introduced and stuff, still, it's funny, I had the whole thing planned out, and as soon as I write it out, it sounds like shit, damn writings a pain in the ass.**

 **Remember to Favorite and sent in your reviews and opinions, they make my writing better, which in turn make the story better, which makes everyone happy.**

 **Anyways kiddies, this had been TwoBearsMagee, stay tuned for chapter 3 of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer'**

 **I love you all**


	4. Chapter 3

**A/N**

 **Hey guys, TwoBearsMagee here, and here's chapter three of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer'. This chapter is Team RWBY meeting James, and a bit more nonsense that spilled out of my insanity ridden brain, hope you enjoy.**

 **Remember to send in reviews and you opinions on the story, and speaking of reviews we have guest responses**

 **Guest - Well I can say James won't be flying of the handle any time soon, he may be an asshole but he's still a nice guy for the most part, good karma and shit. Regarding the whole Ozpin using James thing, Ozpin is a little smarter than that, He sees James can be of use in the future but he won't like, cut off his toes and shit if he doesn't want to help, that doesn't mean James won't be torturing anybody though…**

 **CourierSix - Well I can't 100% tell you for sure if it is, or isn't the Encl-, Ya, No, it totally is them.**

 **ZombieSlayers - Indeed it did Slayers, Indeed it did. (by the way, I laughed for like five minutes straight after I read your review... it was strangely entertaining...)**

 **The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 3**

Beacon Academy - Team RWBY Dorm Room

"Why do we have to do all of this homework~" a short girl with black and red hair complained as she fell back from her sitting position on her bed, which was suspended from the ceiling by ropes, for some reason. _Seriously guys, somebody's gonna die or some shit. It's a fucking safety hazard._

"Ruby, stop whining and do your homework, did you skip ahead two years just to whine about it?" Said a girl with white hair and an light blue nightgown.

" _Weiss_ you gotta be so cold?" A bright blond haired girl joked, recovering from her laughter, she layed on her back to read the newest 'Blue vs. Red' comic. Causing Weiss to scoff and return her gaze to her Grimm Studies.

"Why can't we just eat cookies _then_ do homework, it would be so much better~" Ruby suggested, wiggling her eyebrows and staring at the back of Weiss's head. Causing said girl too sigh and open a drawer in the desk, withdrawing a large box labeled 'cookies' and holding them over her shoulder for Ruby, as she used her semblance to speed off the bed, grab the large box of baked heaven, and speed back onto her bed in a trail of rose petals, the box halfway empty before she even sat back down.

Finishing the box off, Ruby put her scroll into her text book so that Weiss wouldn't notice her playing games, only to pause at a new message displayed on her home screen from the Headmaster that read,

*Ms. Rose, You and your team have been selected to assist one of our new employees in settling down here at Beacon, along with showing him around Vale, as he is not adapt to life in a highly populated city such as Vale, you are to come to my office with your team at eight AM sharp, don't be late, just, be sure to keep him away from situations that may involve violence, I fear he may hurt himself. - Headmaster Ozpin*

Ruby just giggled at the image of a new Janitor, shaking in his boots and clutching a mop as he spotted a cute Grimm plushy in a store window. The giggle however was loud enough to catch Weiss's attention as she stood up and looked over Ruby's book, seeing the Scroll and sending a disapproving glance towards Ruby while she took the scroll and read the message, eyes narrowing in confusion.

Weiss was just reminded of some of the _many suitors_ her father would have brought home in the past, men with no care for her and only wanting the Schnee name. She kicking those men off the city wall, the image brought a slight smile too her face, gaining the curiosity of Yang who jumped out of her bed and snatched the Scroll, reading the message with hopeful eyes.

Except Yang only imagined some short chubby, nerdy guy who just left his mom's basement and somehow got a job in like, the boiler room or something, giving a slightly displeased look on her face, she threw the Scroll over her shoulder, conveniently flying into Blake's lap, taking her attention away from her current book so that she could read the message.

Blake imagined a grizzled depressed Huntsman who was in need of some _Ahem_ relaxation, cheeks slightly pink, and a perverse grin forming on her face as she decided that, a nice, long ' _shower'_ , was all she needed before she went to bed.

"Well I guess we have a newbie to show around tomorrow," Yang whined, "at least we'll get the day off afterwards, I could use some extra sleep after Initiation."

"Ugh, Why do we have too take care of some random guy from some stupid tiny village." Weiss complained, her shoulders sagging and her face scrunching up in annoyance.

"Weiss~, What did I say about making assumptions?" Yang said, Wiggling her eyes.

"You make an ass out of you and me~" Yang finished, and gave Weiss a shit eating grin. (love that saying)

"Humph, He's probably no better than that blond Idiot Jaune." Weiss said, a prissy tone in her voice as she crossed her arms turning her head slightly. (Classic tsundere move mates)

"Weiss, Jaune's not that bad, he's nice... and... he's... well…" Ruby paused, hand on her chin in deep thought,trying to find other good qualities in the blond knight.

"Exactly." Was all Weiss said, pointing at Ruby's face with a smug look pasted on her face, turning back around to put away her homework and turn off the desk light, plunging the room into darkness, the only light being that of the destroyed moon through the window.

"Let's just get some sleep, if we want to get this stupid assignment over with as soon as possible." Yang said, already back in bed and under the covers.

"Goodnight Everyone" Ruby said innocently, only to be answered by a grunt from Weiss, a snore from Yang, and the sound of a shower turning on from the dorm bathroom. Closing her eyes, Ruby immediately fell asleep, hopeful of the next day's events.

Beacon Academy - RWBY Dorm - The Next Morning

The occupants of the RWBY dorm are preparing themselves to show around the new employee around Beacon and Vale.

Ruby was packing snacks and writing down fun ideas for things to do and places to show the new guy, and attempting to get everyone else pumped up for the trip, which wasn't working to well to her dismay.

Weiss was trying too look for the bright side of the situation she hated…

Yang was trying, and failing to escape the room without anyone noticing so that she could avoid this whole mess, as far as she was concerned, this guy was probably just gonna stare at her boobs the whole time, the thought of it making her shiver in disgust… ' _Ugh…_ '

And Blake, Well she was lost in her own thought, not because of the night before, but because she was thinking clearly, ' _Ninjas of Love always keeps me from thinking straight, curse you, you beautiful piece of literary genius.'_

But now, sitting on her bed, with a clear head, and the message from the night before playing out in her mind over and over, she was starting to get a bit suspicious. ' _Why did the headmaster contact a team of first years for this? Wouldn't a second or third year team be better suited?'_ Blake thought to herself, her face not showing her confusion. It just made no sense to her, the only reason the Headmaster would select Team RWBY is if he wanted _us_ specifically to have a connection to this new arrival.

And that just made no sense in its own right, but that wasn't the only thing that was confusing as hell, ' _If he's the same age as us, than how the hell did he become an employee at Beacon? He would have to have a Hunter's Licence, and if someone that young got a hunter's Licence that early, than it would have been all over the news.'_ Blake thought to herself, only to be distracted by the annoyed grunts coming from the blond who tried jumping out of the window, only for a white glyph to block her way, the sound shaking her out of her thought.

"Yang Xiao Long, if I have to embark on this preposterous assignment, so do you." Weiss said raising her voice as she put on a white blazer with red highlights, a black skirt going down to her knee, and a pair of white low heeled shoes, her asymmetrical ponytail in it's usual place.

"Ugh, why did Ozpin have to pick us too show the new guy around, it's gonna be so~ boring~" Yang said, her shoulders slumped in defeat and disappointment in her voice, she didn't want to have to deal with some stupid secretary or something, she didn't even want to wake up before nine today. But low and behold, it was 7:30 in the god damned morning, and here she was, awake and dressed in her casual attire, which consisted of a yellow tank top under a leather jacket, blue jeans, and a pair of large brown boots, you never know when you need to kick some dicks in the dick… (Heh... Kinky)

"I'm kinda excited, we get to be the face of Beacon, isn't it exciting?" Ruby squealed, picking up her red cloak and putting it on over her black t-shirt, a black skirt that faded to red as it went down to her knee, with a pair of tall black boots and black stockings.

"Alright Team RWBY~, are we all ready to go?" Ruby asked, turning on her heal too look at her teammates, nodding her head, Ruby spun again and opened the door, ready to face the day ahead of her with a smile.

Only to slam her face directly into the door, crushing her face along with her hopes and dreams of being a cool leader.

Beacon Academy - James Hardigan Residence

"Fucking, fuckity fucking _fuck,_ _FUCK,"_ James yelled into his scroll "I don't wanna deal with a bunch of prissy bitches, Just let me loose on the town Ozzy, that's how I _survive!_ " James finished, pacing around his room,

And slamming his shin into the coffee table, causing James to spout an unintelligible stream of profanity, AND throw the coffee table out the three story dorm window, causing a very feminine scream, and someone yelling "Jaune, are you ok?"

"Mr. Hardigan, it is protocol that you get to know these students, as you will be both protecting them from harm and teaching them to fight the creatures of Grimm. It is your responsibility as a Beacon employee to teach these children on how to act." Ozpin said, annoyance clear in his voice as James both refused to listen and understand the concept 'stop cussing'

"Fine Ozzy, I'll go on you little field trip, hell i'll even be nice too the bitches, but at least one of these chicks, one at a minimum, has to be smokin' hot, that's all I gotta say Ozzy." James said with a sigh, hanging up immediately after and atomizing the scroll, he sat down on his new, _almost,_ pristine couch, and surveyed the room.

It was a small room, but it was also well furnished, giving it a cozy and homely feel, an attached kitchenette complete with a stove, microwave, and a small fridge. There was no bedroom, or even a bed really, apparently they didn't have enough funds to give all of the teachers beds because they spent all their money on student beds, so James just de-atomized the 'Roughin It! Bedroll Kit' and put it on the couch. In the corner of the room was a pile surveillance cameras. They were hidden in really crappy places, like inside of a radio,

"Fucking radios…" James said with a sneer, picking up his .45 from the pile of things on the floor that were previously on the coffee table, and shoot the radio in the pile.

James fucking _hated radios_ , with a burning passion, like if he had to chose from saving a bucket of babies from a Deathclaw, and shooting a radio, he would shoot the god damned radio without hesitation.

However, now James had something else too hate until it died, that something being, James paused and shivered in fear of the, _responsibilities_ , of being a Beacon employee, which involved interacting with new people instead of going to the armory, stealing all the weapons and ammo, and cobbling it all together into some death ray of doom held together by eight rolls of duct tape and a tin can.

"Ugh, a fucking death ray would be totally badass right now." James whined to himself, he definitely liked weapons better than people, except Cass, Cass was hot, _and_ she liked drinking, A double whammy if you asked James, which combined with James's, as some would call it 'Drinking problem' usually ended in either mind blowing sex, or half of New Vegas wanting them dead because they somehow tp'd the entirety of the Gomorrah.

' _Good times, good times indeed.'_ James thought to himself with a smirk, he always liked Cass, he missed her if he was honest, but he wasn't, so if anybody asked he would call Cass a bitch and punch whomever asked the question in the face. And Cass would do the same if asked the same question.

James was broken out of his internal musings by a beeping sound coming from his Pip-Boy. It was another one of those strange messages, but instead of an error, it displayed something else.

*CONNECTION SUCCESSFUL WITH ROBCO SATELLITE - THANK YOU FOR CHOOSING ROBCO INDUSTRIES FOR ALL OF YOU INFORMATION NEEDS*

"Fucking finally, Jesus Christ took your 200 year old piece of shit long enough." James said, dismissing the message and downloading the map information and checking the region name.

"Fuck, that's what Vale is, its the fucking region were in, damn i'm an idiot!" James laughed, face palming and taking a sip from an unmarked flask. After feeling sufficiently buzzed after a couple more sips, _ok let's be honest he drank like four bottles of some liquor he found in the teacher's lounge that tasted like bourbon_. James headed to the door, de-atomizing his Reilly's Rangers Fatigues on and walking out of the room, headed for Ozpin's office to be officially 'Welcomed to Beacon'.

Beacon Academy - Headmaster Ozpin's Office

"I am sure he will be arriving soon Ms. Rose, I assure you he is probably just exhausted from his journey here." Ozpin said, glancing to the elevator doors and hoping too Monty that James got here soon, he hated having so many people in his office at one time and he wanted them out ASAP.

The elevator made a dinging sound and slid open smoothly to reveal to Team RWBY, a man wearing what looked to be beige and brown military fatigues, although they looked worn down and patched in many places, a white four leaf clover with cutlasses crossed over them, bordered in dark green, the words 'Reilly's Rangers' clearly etched under the emblem.

The man entered the room quickly and confidently, feet hardly making a sound on the wooden floor, a strange rectangular computer strapped to his left forearm. He snapped to a stop in front of the four girls with a strong military salute, and went into a flawless parade rest immediately after. The man looked like a well well oiled killing machine, a holster attached to his hip containing a large handgun, jet black hair cut short and bright blue orbs looking straight ahead, the two circular scars on his forehead and single long scar on his opposite cheek speaking volumes of his past experiences.

The man was nothing any of Team RWBY though he would be, suffice to say that even the headmaster was surprised at how seriously James was taking his orders.

Ruby was expecting a man scared of his own shadows, but instead was greeted to a man whom looked like he spit in death's face on a regular basis, and walked away without so much as a care in the world. Weiss was expecting some, pardon my french, asshole who was going to try and make a move on her out of greed, instead she was reminded of the many faceless private security guards that would be standing in every corner of the Schnee Estate. Yang, expecting some out of shape, neck beard, but was instead welcomed too a tight t-shirt over a toned muscular man with nigh an ounce of fat on his body. And Blake, fearing some secret white fang assassin or some shit, a bit less worried too find what looked like a career soldier, a man who probably hated fauns's but that didn't really matter as long as he didn't show it too often or know she was one.

To make a long story short, everyone's jaws were on the floor, their eyes bulging out of their heads in varying degrees.

"Mr. Hardigan, it is nice of you to join us," Ozpin said, looking up at a nearby clock. "ten minutes late." Ozpin finished, sending a questioning glance towards James

"I had to find my way back here Headmaster, this school is like a maze." James responded respectfully, adopting a military tone he would normally only use with The Rangers or The Brotherhood.

"Ms. Rose, May I introduce Corporal James Hardigan, he is the new member of the security staff, along with a combat instructor next to Ms. Goodwitch." Ozpin said, Gesturing towards James who was still at parade rest, narrowing his eyebrows at the rank, only to be ignored by Ozpin.

"Mr. Hardigan, please relax, their is no need for such protocol in this office." Ozpin said, James responded by clasping his hands in front of him, still remaining respectful, _somehow_ , "This is Team RWBY, and they will be showing you around the campus along showing you around the city of Vale so that you can familiarize yourself with your surroundings."

"This is the new employee we are going to be showing around?" Weiss asked surprised at the recent revelation and cutting of Ozpin.

"Yes Ms. Schnee, that is indeed the new employee," Ozpin said, rubbing his temples and hoping to suppress his now growing migraine. "I hope it won't be a problem, because you will be seeing him everyday, as your schedule says you have his combat class instead of Ms. Goodwitch's." Ozpin finished, the whole point of making James a combat instructor was so that Glynda didn't snap from the stress of teaching a couple hundred hormonal teenagers with the equivalent of super powers alone.

"As I was saying before you very rudely interrupted me." Ozpin stated, giving Weiss a small glare before continuing, making Weiss blush a bit in embarrassment, "James, This Is Ruby Rose, Yang Xiao Long, Weiss Schnee, and Blake Belladonna, and they are Team RWBY, Ruby is the leader, so please go to her about any questions you may have about the city or your time here at Beacon." Ozpin finished, gesturing to each member as he spoke their names.

"Yes headmaster, I will call you if the need arises." James said respectfully, giving both Team RWBY and the headmaster an affirming nod.

"Alright Team RWBY~" Ruby shouted, pumping her fist in the air, only to get empty stares from the other occupants in the room. Ruby was disappointed at her team's lack of excitement. Only to hear someone stomp their feet, she looked towards James and noticed he had adopted a strange crouched stance, his knees far apart, he just stared at Ruby for a moment, _until._

"WOOHOO~ YEA, WOOO~" James yelled, pumping both his fists in the air in his crouched position, one he would later call the, _slava squat_.

Everyone in the room could hear the two resounding slaps coming from Ozpin and Glynda as they facepalmed at the sight.

"It was only a matter of time before he pulled something like this." Glynda said, her face screaming 'Fuck my life'

"Yes, yes it was," Ozpin responded, looking towards Team RWBY "I at least hoped he wouldn't pull anything before he got them out of my office." Ozpin finished, all of team RWBY looking at him in surprise at the revilation.

"I like him," Ruby said, "He has, what's the word for it?" She asked, looking too her team.

"Insanity?" Weiss answered, "No it's not insanity, it's something nicer." Ruby responded, looking too James again, who just paused mid fist pump, his face looked like a dog who broke something, and you know he did, but he's just kinda sitting there, like a _bitch_ (I love dogs plz dont hurt me)

"Pazaz, that's it, he has pazaz." Ruby said, shaking her hands in a, 'Jazz hands' motion

"I like this one, she's funny, I think i'll keep her." James said simply, pointing at Ruby with a hearty laugh as he stood up normally again,

He than proceeded to pick up Ruby and put her on his shoulders with a laugh.

"Where would you like to go child with decent humor?" James asked with another loud laugh, making Ruby laugh like a maniac, the only thing she was missing too make her look like an evil movie villain was a white cat with a blind eye and a bow tie. (Heh, _Rhymes)_

"Hey, that's my sister!" Yang yelled, pointing at Ruby and giving james an 'I'll fucking kill you' face as she shook her fists at him, he just kinda stared at blankly at her for a moment, until he simply continued giving Ruby a piggyback ride. Yang paused 'I haven't heard Ruby laugh this much since she got into the cookie factory and started bathing in the dough' Yang thought as she stopped yelling at James.

"James, please put Ms. Rose down." Ozpin said in a disappointed tone through his hand, which had taken up permanent residence attached to his face.

"Awww~" Both James and Ruby whined at the same time, giving eachother a high five immediately after.

James walked with Ruby too her team, all of which were now completely stunned, lots of bulged eyes and dropped jaws, you know the drill.

Weiss was just disappointed in the world, ' _Could I meet one person who isn't a complete weirdo for once in my life?_ ' she thought to herself

Yang was mortified that someone was messing with her sister, 'Shit, now I gotta kill him, too bad, he was kinda hot.' Yang though, disappointed at what she had to do.

Blake, well she was fiercely jotting something in a little black notebook, nobody knows what's in the notebook, some say it's a autobiography, others say its a sluttly journel, _but we all know what it really is…._

"James, please just go and follow them too town, just do it, ok?" Ozpin said, one word from James away from losing his shit and beating him over the head with his coffee pot.

"Yes Sir" James said with a mock two fingered salute, making Ozpin sigh in relief that he wouldn't have to beat any children, _yet_

"Monty, I can feel the headache coming on already." Weiss whispered to herself, rubbing her temples, and hoping that it was all just some sick joke. She was truly afraid of what the cookie loving reaper, and whatever the hell James was, could do if they coordinated their efforts.

"They actually make a pretty good team." Yang said, "Ruby and James I mean, they look like there secretly plotting the world's largest and most elaborate cookie heist or something." she finished, pointing too James and Ruby, whom were huddled together and writing stuff on a map, and holding ski masks in their hands.

"Were Compromised!" James yelled, grabbing Ruby and combat rolling into the opan elevator, making the WBY of Team RWBY follow close behind too not be left in the large clock motif office.

"You think we're gonna need to bail them out of jail?" Glynda asked seriously.

"Probably." Ozpin said, taking a sip from his mug of, _cold coffee_.

Ozpin hoped this wasn't a trend that would continue for long, because if it did, he might just have to kill whomever made his coffee, because this was unacceptable.

 **A/N**

 **Hey guys, sorry this chapter is a little late, I was a bit distracted with my local ComicCon coming up on tomorrow and FUCKING FAR HARBOR MADE ME WANT TO PLAY ALL THE FALLOUT GAMES _AGAIN_.**

 **Any who** **with that out of the way, James is a fucking weirdo, Ruby and James are already bonding over cookie heists,** _ **cause their fucking weirdos**_ **, and Ozpin is about to lose his shit. Yup, i'd say it was a pretty successful chapter indeed.**

 **Pairing poll up on my profile, vote you dicks... (please)**

 **I love seeing your feedback, opinions and conspiracy theory's on this story in reviews and PM's.**

 **Anyways my kiddies, this been TwoBearsMagee, and you've been reading FanFiction**

 **Stay tuned for chapter four of 'A Ghosts of a Wanderer'**


	5. Chapter 4

**A/N**

 **So boys and girls, chapter 4, abide a little late, but chapter 4 none the less, the next chapter might be late too, I was driving home from work and my truck engin decided to burst into flames, so now I need to replace it,** _ **yay**_ **, well less of my garbage life, let's move on to that sucks less than my ability to write, that's right, the poll results!**

 **The Poll results as of now are,**

 **Velvet - 5**

 **Blake - 4**

 **Yang - 4**

 **Glynda - 4**

 **None - 3**

 **Sorry guys, I was messing with the setting and accidentally closed the poll, it's back up again and if you haven't voted yet you should**

 **That's right boys and girls the James x Velvet is in the lead, with Blake Yang, and Glynda hot on her cute bunny tail, get too voting people. The poll will be closed tomorrow, so if you wanna vote, vote now people, or forever hold your piece.**

 **And now for Guest Review responses, only one this time around**

 **Guest - The no kill rule will be soon, and yes, Ozpin will probably go mad, James is difficult to deal with at time, especially with the roller pin granny's, (Wild wasteland perk for the win.) i may give the granny's a little cameo in this story later, tell me if you catch it XD.**

 **Remember to Review your opinions on the story so far, I can't make anything better if you don't help me, and if you're just don't feel motivated enough, I brought someone to help.**

 **Shia Labeouf - JUST DO IT!**

 **Thanks Shia, now, on with the story, go, why are you still reading this, the stories down there dipshit.**

 **The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 4**

Somewhere In The Grimlands Near Mt. Glenn

"Sir, are you sure you want to send a team?" A blond man said, adorning a grey and black accented officers uniform and a golden leaf pinned to his collar.

"Yes Major, I want that vehicle in our possession before the day is out." the former Colonel of Sensor Base Epsilon said, silver eagle replaced by the silver the stars pinned to his collar, denoting him as a new Brigadier General.

He had been assigned the job of keeping tabs on the Brotherhood team on 'Remnant' as the locals called it. And damn was it an easy job. In fact, he was already forming two teams, one assault team to retrieve the Brotherhood vehicle in search for any information they could find, and another, being an undercover team, to keep tabs on the new Brotherhood recon team, which apparently only consisted of one paladin to his surprise.

"Sir, if I may, if the assault team is caught, or seen even, it could spell disaster for our plans." The blond haired major said nervously. "Not too mention if the Undercover team is caught, we wouldn't be able to extract them without creating massive panic, thus speeding up the timetable." The Major finished, making the white haired senior put on a scowl, he hated when people questioned him, he would prove himself with this mission if it was the last thing he did, and nobody was going to stop him.

"Yes, _Major_ ," The General said, stressing the word 'Major' "And if you would like to keep that title you will do as I said and send the OK too the ground teams." The man snarled, his threat hitting home and making the Major tense up.

"Y- Yes Sir, right away." The Blond mas stated in fear, quickly pacing over to another officer at a computer screen, and telling him to give the order too the ground teams that they were a go for their mission.

The only reaction the newly appointed General had, was too enter a metallic sliding door with the words 'Brigadier General Kenneth Douglass' stenciled on it, his office. As soon as the door closed, Douglass quietly sighed, deep in thought, he walked to large cushioned office chair behind a large oak desk, and poured himself a glass of Bourbon, or at least it tasted like bourbon, none of the food was real here, it was all synthetically created, It was the easiest thing to make on their long trip.

Doubtless spun around in his office chair and looked out of a view port behind him, looking down onto the luscious green canyon below him.

"I never can get used too this view." Douglas said, taking a small sip from his brown beverage.

Douglas had no idea what he was in from if he was gonna deal with James, Because James,

 _well he just fucks shit up._

En-route to The City Of Vale

"So, I guess i'm gonna be your teacher from now on then?" James asked seriously, Ruby on his shoulders eating from a box of cookies, and occasionally passing one too James, while they stood in a transport ship headed Back to Beacon.

"That's right pal, and with you and my sister hitting it off so quickly, we're gonna become the _best_ _of friends_ from now on!" The Buxom Blonde said with a slight chuckle, punching James's shoulder in an attempt to intimidate the wasteland legend, only too quietly gasp in pain from the sudden impact, ' _He's like punching a solid steel wall.'_ Yang thought in surprise, rubbing her knuckles as James just sent her a sly smirk.

' _This guy's fucking strong'_ Yang thought to herself, usually if she punched someone they would go flying faster than Junior when she went to the club.

"I always wanted a little sister." James said in a high tone of voice, a wide smile on his face as he accepting another cookie from Ruby, whom had been constantly feeding him the small baked goods since they got out of the elevator.

"Just don't hurt my sister and we'll be friends for a _long_ time." Yang said, a threatening smile on her face as she tried another attempt to scare the new teacher, and it would have worked to is it were, well, _literally anyone else on the planet_ , they would have probably just run for their lives. But James literally just didn't give a shit, he just smiled widely back at Yang and gave her an exaggerated double thumbs up. Causing Yang's face too get red in anger and annoyance.

The airship docking with Vale airport being the eventual sound too break yang from her long and intense glare being directed at James, who, the whole trip, had decided to feign ignorance and continue having childlike fun with Ruby, Eating cookies and playing rock, paper, scissors and stuff. (Ya that's right ya perverts, nothing dirty here, just pure childish fun, ya fuckin' _Pervs_ )

"Anyways, where can I buy some food in this place," James asked as he rubbed his stomach "Seriously, I don't think I have eaten for, hmm, three days? Ya that sounds about right."

James didn't get a response, in fact, it was completely silent apart from the low hum of the airships engines. James looked around at the people with him, and found everyone staring at him, as if he had grown a second head that started singing opera or something, and last time he checked he cut that annoying fucker off.

James was broken out of his musings by a strong tug from his right arm as he was dragged out of the airship by Ruby, who decided that not eating for that long was NOT good for you, causing James to quietly spout a stream of profanities as he was dragged faster than he had ever moved in his life, ' _Well apart from when I stole that Enclave vertibird and flew it around the wasteland for awhile, heh, the look on Sarah's face when I did that loop, priceless!'_ James thought to himself, zoning out while he was pulled around town, a trail of bright red petals creating a path for the rest of team RWBY too follow at their own pace, leaving James to wrath of the red reaper.

Somewhere In The Grimlands Near Mt. Glenn

"Sir, the undercover team reports that they have eyes on the target," a male voice said over the intercom on Douglas's desk, pulling him from the view he had been gazing at intently for the past half hour, "They are also reporting that attached to his wrist is what they think is a Pip-Boy, but they aren't one hundred percent sure yet, sir."

The new information was both extremely helpful, and extremely worrying, if the thing strapped to this, _primitives_ , arm was in fact a Pip-Boy, than that would make him a vault dweller, and vault dwellers were, too put it simply, a pretty big pain in the ass for the Enclave, and that was putting it lightly. They were, in fact, like the Achilles heel of the Enclave, whenever they were getting somewhere, a god damned vault dweller would show up out of the blue, and fuck it all up, it was, _irritating._

If this newcomer was indeed a vault dweller, it would suffice to say that he would be a thorn in their side until they found a fast and easy way to eliminate him, _while keeping inconspicuous of the local population._

"Tell them too keep watching, but do not break cover or contact, just tail him and gather whatever intel they can." the man ordered into the intercom, gaining a 'yes sir' from the other end as acknowledgement that the order was relayed successfully.

'This is going to be a long day.' Douglas thought to himself with a sigh and another sip of his 'bourbon'.

City Of Vale - Vale Firearms Emporium And Range

A paper targets center was blown apart like, well, paper. The dust assisted round digging into the concrete, steel, and dirt wall of the indoor rifle range, causing the nearby Ruby to start laughing maniacally at the weapons destructive power.

James was sitting at a shooting table, the barrel of the rented .308 bolt action hunting rifle whisking a small trail of smoke as he cycled the bold, catching and inspecting the ejected casing before it fell to the brass littered ground. He and Ruby had, as of five minutes ago, been at the shooting range for three straight hours, after she had, almost literally, shoved three hamburgers down his throat in the middle of a restaurant, gaining stares from everyone there to witness the spectacle. They had been accepting everyone who challenged their thrones as the self proclaimed shooting champions, only to crush their attackers with the iron fists, _of VICTORY, real dramatic stuff for the two._

When someone from the small crowd that had amassed from the competitions suggested that James and Ruby go against each other for the throne, all hell had broken loose, but in the end James took a hit to the pride and threw the match for Ruby's sake. And it was all worth it when he saw the ginormous grin on Ruby put on when James messed up his last shot, handing the win over on a silver platter, He had really connected with the hooded teen through weapons and cookies in the past three and a half hours. James would however, never admit that he had always wished for a little sister too spoil. If someone asked, what would he do?

Punch them in the face and deny it of course, that's what he normally did when faced with situations that threatened either his pride, or his physical safety. That and drink himself half to death.

James was broken out of his musing by another voice in the crowd challenging him, however, when James looked at the man walking out the the small gathering of people, he was immediately put on guard.

The man _felt_ familiar too James somehow, bleached blond hair, and deep green eyes, the man had the eyes of a skilled hunter, cold and calculating, face emotionless, he was dressed in a pair of dark grey military fatigues, and carried a large black hard case rifle box with him to a shooting table at the immediate left of James and sat at it, he set the case on the table and popped the box open, and withdrew what looked like, too him, a modified .308 military sniper rifle, just like the one he had found in that hollowed out rock behind Megaton.

But Ruby's eyes lit up in excitement, she had never seen a rifle like that before, and sure the man holding it looked a little menacing, but she was amazed at its design, it was unlike anything she had ever seen in the past, but even if this guy had some new design or something, she was absolutely sure in her mind that James would win, ' _he's the best shot I have ever seen, apart from myself of course, I mean, I totally schooled him when we went up against each other,'_ Ruby thought to herself, her ego inflated a bit after the close match with James.

"200 meters, no scope." The man said simply, detaching the scope from the rifle and slamming the magazine into the magwell, he took in a deep breath before he pulled the trigger and fire the round, the observers with binoculars watched as a neat hole was punched dead center of the paper target, the audience letting lose a few 'oohs' and 'aah' at the sight.

"500 meters, no scope," James responded with a smug smirk, "upside down." He finished, a couple of 'what the hell's' coming from the surrounding crowd, completely unaware of James ability to get a little, 'Creative', they were silenced when James detached the scope, and proceeded to tie a rope onto a rickety ceiling fan right above him and his waist, suspending him mid air, _and_ upside down.

Rickety ceiling fans were _totally_ safe after all.

Almost everyone in the room gasped when the rifle in James's arms bucked back, the recoil causing him to swing on the fan, causing it too unsurprisingly fall out of the ceiling and crash on top of him, knocking him unconscious and causing the range owner to walk up to Ruby and demand she pay for it, being the only conscious one of the two she paid for the damage and apologize for James breaking the ceiling fan.

She called the rest of her team, hoping Yang would be gracious enough to help and carry James back to the airport so they could go back to Beacon and get some food, all of the shooting and maniacal laughing making her hungry and drowsy.

Ruby looked too the other shooting table too tell him a rematch would be in order at a letter date, only for her eyes to spot a small yellow sticky note on the table, the only words on it being 'The Hunter'.

Ruby grabbed the ominous note and shoved it into her skirt pocket dismissively with a shrug.

Ruby just continued to hum a cheerful tone while waiting for her team, completely oblivious to the deep green eyes watching her through a pair of binoculars.

"It seems you're here too," The man said with a small smile, moving his gaze back to James's unconscious form on the ground.

"Maby we can finally finish what we started." The man whispered to himself, his smile disappearing from his face as he put away the binoculars and walked back into the proverbial shadows.


	6. Chapter 5

**A/N**

 **The Poll is closed and the winner is...**

 **Velvet - 7**

 **Blake - 6**

 **Yang - 4**

 **Glynda - 4**

 **None - 3**

 **VELVET! Congratulations to anyone who voted on Velvet, if you didn't, well, you'll get em next time sport. *Pats shoulder***

 **So I couldn't really write this chapter before the poll closed, so I had to wait a bit, and due to the whole exploding car fiasco, my life has been a bit of a mess.**

 **However, do you know what's probably not a mess? That's right, hopefully this chapter!**

 **Anyhow, I am looking for a Beta Reader, if your interested shoot me a PM.**

 **And without further adieu, the next chapter.**

 **The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 5**

James slowly gained consciousness, his head throbbing and his back sore, it felt like he had been close lined by a super mutant. He lifted his head up to study his surroundings. He was sitting on what looked like a bench at a picnic table, the loud flurry of conversation and clattering of utensils on plates suggesting he was in some sort of mess hall or cafeteria. James looked too his left at a red caped head, face in a pile of cookies. he tapped her shoulder and she spun around, face covered in cookie crumbs, the crumbs making her look like she had a cookie beard of sorts.

"Oh, hey guys he awake." Ruby said, wiping the crumbs from her face as she spoke.

James looked ahead of him and found Blake directly in front of him, face buried in her book, only sneaking occasional glances at him from over the hardcover. James noticed her bow move slightly when she averted her gaze from his, confusing James a bit, but he was quickly distracted as a plate of food was slid in front of him.

The contents of the plate consisted of a large piece of meat that looked remarkably similar to a Brahmin steak, a pile of white mush with brown liquid drizzled over top of it, and a small pile of yellow blobs.

"What the fuck is this?" James asked in a confused tone, narrowing his eyebrows and poking the yellow bits on his plate with a fork that was resting on the plate with a furrowed brow.

"It's corn," Yang said, "ya know, the vegetable? Have you never had corn before or something?" She asked quizzically, her eyes widening slightly, along with the others of Team RWBY who were still paying attention to the conversation, that being only Yang and Ruby, Blake having lose interest as soon s Yang started talking and Weiss wasn't paying attention to begin with.

"Nope." James answered simply, popping the 'p', and dumped the food onto Yang's plate with a disinterested face.

"I'll just stick to what i'm used too," James said with a large smile resembling something of a maniacal grin.

"DEATHCLAW STEAKS ARE THE ONLY STEAKS FOR ME~!" James yelled with his arms above his head as if he were praising the gods of the sun, as he let his arms fall back down to the table, a bright blue flash made everyone nearby James cover their eyes and look away, temporarily blinded, the only sound they could hear was the resounding slap of meat onto a plate.

Weiss was the first to recover, as she rubbed her eyes and looked too find what had made the disgusting sound, only to be meet with James cutting into a large slab of cooked meat about the size of her head, a small bottle brown liquid sat next to the large plate the steak sat on and a small box sitting next too that, the next too recover was Blake, who due to her faunus heritage could smell the strange steak as soon as it appeared, and upon regaining her vision was surprised that a whole new meal had appeared in front of James as if by his command. The third to recover was Yang, who was too busy trying to scarf down her newly filled plate too notice the new meal on in front of James. Ruby was the last to recover, sitting right next to James didn't help her eyesight at all, and when she was finished rubbing the spots from her vision she didn't see the massive steak or the brown fizzy beverage in front of him, no, instead Ruby saw an open, pure white box with red lettering that said sour words,

*Fancy Lads Snack Cakes*

Ruby had no idea what they were, and if there was anything Ruby liked modes other than cookies and strawberries, it was cakes, and James was distracted with his steak,

'Maybe i'll just sneak a little peek.' Ruby though innocently, 'After all, I did share my cookie stash with him.'

Ruby made her move and grabbed the small white and red box, the light smell of strawberries filling her nostrils as she brought her face closer to the opening of the box, Ruby peared into it and was greeted to the sight of multiple small and slightly pink cupcakes, all looked to be filled with a brown substance, probably chocolate is she had to guess.

Ruby didn't even realize she had eaten half of the box by the time she had caught herself, the small cakes were moist, and filled with chocolate just as she had thought, but had a hint of strawberry to them, too put it bluntly, Ruby was addicted to the little pink bastards, and as soon as Ruby looked up from the box of cakes, she found the entire table staring at her. James included, and when Ruby expected him to be upset with her for stealing his glorious pink pieces of heaven, she was only meet with a pat on the head and a large happy smile.

"You could have just asked," James said with a smile, "Don't worry about it kiddo, You can have the rest of the box if you want." a small laugh finishing his sentence, making Ruby smile widely and continue to eat the little pink cakes.

"Hah, See Cardin, I told you they were real, stupid animal."

James looked directly over Blake's shoulder in search for the voice, and was meet with a situation that made his face morph into a slight scowl. A group of four boys, all clad in the academy's uniform, were pulling on what looked like a ponytail at his distance on the head of a girl, the girl clearly feeling pain from the action if the tears on her face and the clear pleads for them too stop were any confirmation.

And as a new member of the security staff, and the new combat instructor, James would not idly sit by as a student was hurt in his presence, so being the sensible person he always was, (*Cough* Bullshit *Cough*), James stood up calmly, and went to address the problem at the source.

James, despite looking completely calm and collected on the outside with a neutral face, was seething with anger towards the small group of boys he was on his way to meet 'peacefully', the last time James caught someone abusing an innocent young girl, well, let's just say brain matter was an absolute pain in the ass, too get out of his jumpsuit, like seriously, there's a permanent purple spot on like half his jumpsuit.

By the time James was five feet from the largest of the group of people, he spoke up.

"Is there a problem here boys?" James asked, he had read a lot about the school the night before. Stuff like how the teams worked, what Grimm were, and a few other things that had a 'Top Secret' label on them, but when the hell did that ever stop James.

"Who do you think you are asshole, get the fuck out of here before we beat the shit out of you just like this animal." The largest boy said, a large head of bright red hair on his head and a smug look on his face as he slapped the back of the brunette's head, not even noticing the small twitch of James's eye and the sickening smile form on his face.

Cardin feel a small tap on his shoulder as he turned around to yell at the person for interrupting his fun again,

Cardin, instead of yelling at the newcomer, was meet with the sickening crack of his nose as it was broken. a fist slamming into his face as maximum velocity, causing him to recoil back and hiss in pain, cradling his nose as blood flowed freely into his hand.

All of the previous sound in the mess hall were silenced as Cardin's blood dripped onto the floor, Ruby was worried about James, Yang was excited too see him bash Cardin's face in, Weiss was both appalled at James's actions, and intrigued to see the school bully get his ass kicked, and Blake, well Blake was slightly impressed that James was standing up for a faunus, the act giving him points in her book, both literally and figuratively as she started furiously writing in her small notebook.

Cardin's face contorted from pain into unadulterated rage as he stared at his blood soaked hand for a moment in disbelief, looking back at James,

"He's mine." Carding hissed, voice filled with rage as he pointing at James with his blood soaked hand, the red life fluid dripping from the tip of his extended finger. Causing the other three on the team to back away in both acceptance and fear of a beating from their leader.

"He is NOT, yours." A voice spoke up, riding crop in hand, with a scowl to match, Glynda Goodwitch advanced into the cafeteria to where the soon to be fight had been in the making. "Mr. Hardigan here is to be be shown no disrespect." Glynda informed, riding crop pointed slightly at James, "Am I clear Mr. Winchester?" she asked, receiving a reluctant nod, paired with a death glare towards James, who in light of the statement put on a smug face and started turning to walk away, only to be stopped by Glynda.

"However Mr. Hardigan, that doesn't mean you can break the noses of your students." a large portion of the room feel silent, only slight murmurs of speculation in the moment after the revelation that James was a teacher.

"Oh come on Titts Magee, I was only gonna shove his own foot up his ass halfway~." James said with an innocent look on his face somehow, eliciting gasps of disbelief throughout the cafeteria. Glynda simply frowned.

She disliked the nickname James had given her, actually dislike was too nice of a word, Glynda. FUCKING. HATED IT. HATED IT WITH A BURNING PASSION AKIN TO THE FIERY DEPTHS OF HELL. But she would never say that out loud.

"Mr. Hardigan, as a teacher you need to teach your students how to protect the weak and innocent, that is your only job." Glynda said, tone akin to that of a mother scolding a child for stealing from the cookie jar.

"However, Ms. Goodwitch, you were not here to witness this man," James yelled dramatically, pointing at Cardin, "Assaulting this young woman by pulling on her- erm-, wait… what?" James paused, his eyes widening slightly as soon as they fell onto the shy brunette's head.

"Mr. Hardigan?" Glynda asked, "Are you alright, you said team Mr. Winchester was assaulting Ms. Scarlatina?"

James however didn't hear Glynda in the slightest, he was too deep in thought at the sudden revelation that the girl he had just attempted to rescue, well, she had bunny ears,

"Cute." James said simply, his face neutral as he stared at the embarrassed Velvet.

"P- Pardon me?" Velvet said, rubbing her right ear in her hand, eyes looking everywhere other than where James was standing.

"Mr. Hardigan, are you, alright?" Glynda asked a little louder and with a slightly annoyed hint in her voice, snapping him out of his stupor, James was never really one to see things as 'cute' seeing as he murdered people for a living, so imagine his own surprise when he heard himself just say cute out of nowhere.

"Yea, i'm good Glynda," James said, surprising Glynda a bit seeing as too he called her by her name and not that stupid, fucking, NICKNAME. "I think i'm just a bit tired is all." James lied, James wasn't tired at all, in fact, he was amped up from breaking someone's nose, walking back to the table team RWBY were sitting at and sitting back down in front of his steak, taking a long swig from his Nuka Cola, he ignored the stares from everyone at the table, and the suggestively raised eyebrows from Yang as he finished his dinner in silence.

As soon as James finished his steak, he pulled another white and red box out of his cargo pocket and handed it to an ecstatic Ruby, sneaking away as she devoured the little pink cakes like a savage animal. as he made his way out of the double doors of the cafeteria however, a pair of brown eyes stared at him as he exited, intent on thanking him properly for saving her.

'I mean it's only polite right?' the bunny faunus thought, walking swiftly after the strange black haired blue eyed individual in hopes of catching him before he got too his room.

 **A/N**

 **OK, I'm back**

 **After replacing an entire engine and finding the scrap yard sold me a shit engine, I sold my junker and bought a new truck,**

 **So that's my excuse for being late with the new chapter.**

 **Ok, the James x Velvet is gonna be hard for me to write, I already have a flurry of fluff tastic things for later on in the story, but that's for later. For now, I wanna hear your feedback, and any of the possible mistakes I have most definitely made.**

 **Apart from constructive criticism, I am, again, looking for a Beta Reader, if your interested, send me a PM.**

 **I love you all, TwoBearsMagee**

 **I hope too see you here for the next hopefully exciting chapter of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer'**


	7. Chapter 6

**Hello boys, girls, apache attack helicopters, welcome to the sixth chapter of The Ghosts of a Wanderer, in regards to the lateness of this short as fuck chapter, view the below Author's note, and without further adieu, i give you, the next chapter...**

 **The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 6**

James was confused as fuck, no doubt about it, but now he had two choose on what he was going to do while being confused as fuck.

First, he can drink himself half to death like he did normally when women were involved. Or second, he can drink himself half to death and attempt to talk too said female in question.

Either way, he was getting shit faced drunk.

' _Well if i'm gonna kill my liver I might as well do it in style.'_ James though, pulling out a flask from who the fuck knows where and taking a long drink from his self proclaimed 'lifeblood'.

"Wait, what's the point of a second pair of ears?" James said to himself, brow furrowing in confusion as he walked down the sparsely occupied hallway, only a couple of students rushing to their dorms, intent on getting a full night's rest before the next full day of classes.

"U- Umm, excuse me." A shy feminine voice spoke, tapping James's shoulder in order to get his attention. James turned around, only for his ability to think straight to disappear just like Malcolm Holmes did when he wouldn't shut the fuck up about those damn star caps.

James may have been an absolute badass defender of the wasteland and killer of literally _everything_ , but he was still 17, and susceptible to cute chicks with bunny ears and shit

"Umm, I- I'm Velvet, I just w- wanted to thank you, for, for helping me." the newly dubbed Velvet said, eyes resting on every possible thing in the hallway _except_ for James, her hand nervously playing with the tip of her left ear.

"I'm James, and it's no problem, they were being assholes." James said, eyes staring intently at Velvet, he found the whole awkward / shy stance too be cute, and he had no fucking clue about what the fuck he should be doing, seeing as he only had experience with Cass, and in his opinion she acted more like a guy than a chick. ' _No homo though bro.'_

"W- Well I Just wanted to t- thank you." Velvet said, shyly looking at James and shuffling awkwardly, not moving from her spot,

' _oh god, oh god, oh god,'_ Velvet's mind was racing a mile a minute, ' _what do I do, should I ask him to walk me back to the dorm? or will he think that's weird, ugh, curse you social anxiety!'_

"U- Umm, I, I have to go back to my d- dorm." she said quietly, only barely audible to James, the question causing him to jump and blurt something out without thinking.

"Could I walk with you?" James said, mentally face palming at his actions and causing Velvet to jump a little at the sudden sound and look back at him, her response being a couple of quick nods of her head as James took the opportunity to catch up to her and get into a position next to her as they started the short trek towards her dorm room.

The walk through the now crowded hallways too Velvet's dorm was uneventful, until they got too Velvets dorm, the door looked the same as every other door in the hallway, the words 'Team CFVY' carved into a small plaque attached at eye level of the door.

"This is it." Velvet said with a small smile on her face, wile turning back too James, "Thank you for walking me back to my dorm."

"No problem Velvet." James said matching her small smile and bowing playfully eliciting a small giggle from Velvet as she opened her dorm door.

Only for the door to reveal a ginormous brute of a man in running black running shorts and a white t-shirt too reach for the now opened door as if he had intended to open it, his eyes softening at the sight of Velvet opening the door, only to immediately harden into a glare at the sight of a stranger directly behind the bunny faunus.

"Oh, Hi Yatsuhashi." Velvet said with a smile, giving him a small wave, causing the large man too stop Glaring daggers at James and smile at Velvet with a nod in response.

"This Is James, he saved me from Cardin and his team earlier at dinner." Velvet said, smile getting a little bigger while gesturing at James and looking back at him, "Oh, James, this is Yatsuhashi, he's on my team." Velvet said, completely oblivious to the pair of hard brown eyes meticulously picking apart James from his shoe size too the shape of his nose.

"Heh, yea, nice too meet ya buddy." James awkwardly said, nervously fiddling with his Pip-Boy and trying to ignore the mental deathtrap that was Yatsuhashi's threatening glare.

Velvet noticed that Yatsuhashi was now glaring threateningly at James and just sighed quietly,

"Yatsuhashi Daichi, what did I say about threatening my friends?" Velvet said, waggling her finger at Yatsuhashi and sending a disappointed glare his way, the act reminded James of how a mother would scold their child. Yatsuhashi just stared at Velvet and nodded his head several times, making Velvet put her face in her hand and turn back too James,

"Yatsuhashi wants to challenge you to an arm wrestling contest," Velvet said, with a worried look on her face "I- I mean, you don't have too, b- but ya know." she said quickly, waving her hands in front of her for a second, James just looked at Yatsuhashi and chugged the rest of the contents from his flask.

"What the hell could go wrong." James said loudly, a small cuss making its way from his mouth as soon as Yatsuhashi grabbed him by the arm and yanked him inside, closing and locking the door in order to keep Velvet out for the duration of the contest.

 **Outside of Team CFVY's Dorm**

'First Yatsuhashi made me ask James too that stupid contest, and then James had too freaking accept, and then Yatsuhashi had too FRIKIN LOCK ME OUT OF OUR DORM.' Velvet mentally screamed, slamming her head against the door lightly and groaning out loud, 'Why does Yatsuhashi have to do this with _every_ guy I think is cute?' Velvet though with another groan, ceasing her head slamming and sliding down the wall into a sitting position, 'I just hope James can forgive me for whatever injuries Yatsuhashi is gonna give him.' Velvet though, her head in her hands as she waited for her partner to unlock the door so that she can take James to the infirmary.

 **Inside of Team CFVY's Dorm**

'He's just sitting there,' James though, a shiver moving up his spine ' _menacingly_.'

James was sitting in a small collapsible chair directly across from Yatsuhashi as Velvet had called him, a small table being the only thing between the two men, well, not really _men_ but you get the picture.

"OK~" James said, dragging it out for as long as he could while avoiding eye contact, normally when presented with a foe larger or stronger than himself he would just continually throw plasma grenades at it until it died, if that didn't work he essential fucked off and ran away like a bitch, ' _Hey it's not called running away, it's called a tactical retreat._ ', _What the fuck did I say James, don't fucking break the wall you ass hat, it's expensive._

Anyways, James was feeling the pressure, this Yatsuhashi guy looked like he could box a Deathclaw and leave without so much as a care in the world.

And that was fucking scary too James.

Shure James had saved the whole wasteland, exterminated the Enclave, fixed the purifier in order to give the whole fucking state clean water, defeated the Legion and won the battle for Hoover Dam, all while being harassed by super mutants and junkie raiders in the process. But that didn't mean he was good at talking to people, like seriously, he usually just bullshits his way through everything.

Like right now, James was currently sitting in his chair and putting on his best neutral face while mentally screaming bloody murder about not being drunk enough for this bullshit, however James was pulled out of his mental mind fuckery by Yatsuhashi placing his elbow on the table and holding his hand out for James to take it.

'Shit, I am totally not prepared for this shit' James thought glumly, resigning to his fate, James took Yatsuhashi's hand and looked at him, his cold brown eyes giving James's bright blue ones a disapproving glare. His eyes bolting to the hands clasp together, prepared to test James's strength, and then back up too James, almost as if he were asking if James was ready. James gave Yatsuhashi a small nod, barely noticeable if you weren't paying wrapped attending too the battle of wits and strength accuring at the table, and as if by the ring of an invisible bell, the two men (boys) began there battle.

Only for it to be cut short by the loud and sickening snap that can only be made when a bone broken.

Both James and Yatsuhashi looked at each other slowly trailing their eyes too their arms too see half of Yatsuhashi's arm upright and half resting on the table, the only thing keeping his forearm attached was his skin, and muscles.

"Oh shit" was the only thing that James mind could think as the door to the dorm opened, revealing the shocked face of Velvet.

And at that moment, James knew, that he had _fucked up…_

 **A/N**

 **Yes, James has other weaknesses, and yes, one of them is women, he may be a messiah of the wastes, but that doesn't change that he's 17 and his only experienced it with a drunk as fuck Cass...**

 **Eyyyy shity cliffhanger for a short as fuck chapter, sorry guys, but life had bogged me down into hell, and, too top it all off i'm a semi-popular account on ifunny now, I post fallout, and fallout related content, with 80 subs and growing rapidly, throw me a sub if you have an account, username is, TwoBearsHighFiveing, Anyways, i'm also taking writing classes online, and I had to fix the exploding car debacle, so sorry for the wait guys, i'll try to make the next chapter longer than normal**

 **Also, still looking for a BETA Reader, if you are interested, please PM me.**

 **Love you all, and stay tuned for the next shity ass chapter of, The Ghosts of a Wanderer**


	8. Chapter 7

**The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 7**

"WAKE UP"

SLAP

"Ow, What the heck Amata, i'm trying to sleep here."James said, rubbing his forehead and looking at Amata. Whom, to James's surprise, was proceeding too cry her eyes out and rush around his small quarters, grabbing the stimpacks from the first aid box and his baseball bat from beside his desk, throwing them haphazardly in the center of his small quarters.

Sirens began to blare in the room, Making James's eyes bolt open, his prior fatigue completely forgotten. scenarios began to run through his mind, ' _Did someone get through the door, no, the door has never been open, has there been a mutiny?_ ' James was completely stumped.

"What the heck is going on Amata?" James asked, roughly grabbing her by the shoulders, her face had a permanent look of despair as she grabbed James and hugged his chest tightly. James could feel the tears soaking into his vault suit.

"My dad, James, he's gone mad, he killed Jonah and now they're looking for you next!" Amata whimpered out between sobs, her face buried deep into his chest.

James was shocked, why the heck were they looking for him, he was fifteen for god sakes, he's never done anything wrong, if anything the worst thing he had ever done was steal a Fancy Lad from the cafeteria.

"But where's my dad Amata? I'm sure all of this is just some huge mistake." James said quietly, Amatas words still echoing through his mind, ' _How could any of this be true, Jonah was a model citizen. Why would the Overseer kill Jonah?_ '

"James, your dad, your dad left the Vault…" Amata said, the words stopping James in his proverbial tracks, Had he heard her right, did she just say that his dad had _left_ the vault, the very vault they were both born in, the very vault that had NEVER been opened up to the outside world?

"H- He's gone?" James whispered with widened eyes, "How could he just LEAVE!" James was starting to collapse under the pressure. What was he going to do?

However all of James's mental panic was interrupted by a stabbing pain in the left side of his neck. James's eyes snapped open, Black began too boarder his vision as he watched Amata back away from his slowly collapsing body, horror in her eyes, and tears streaming down her face.

James dropped to his knees, he could feel numbness slowly but surely creeping up his extremities, James's hand made it's way too the origin of the stabbing pain in his neck, his eyes never leaving Amata as she ran out of room to back away from him and hit the concrete wall of his room, her face still holding that look of horror and regret, she slit to the ground, her eyes wide as saucers, and tears still running freely from her face as she sobbed.

As his hand neared the origin of the stabbing pain, he felt the familiar feel of a syringe in his neck, he yanked it out, and brought it into his vision, the plunger only halfway depressed, a large amount of liquid being still in the syringe, James spied the liquid and recognized it immediately as sedative, the slightly cloudy color giving it's purpose away. When James had helped his dad in the Infirmary in the past, he had only seen him sedative once, when Stanley dropped a steak knife on his food on the Overseer's birthday.

James fell onto his front as his vision started to fade, he couldn't feel his arms or legs now, and he couldn't move his head, his eyes glued to Amata crying something he couldn't hear, it was strange to him, he could see her mouth moving, but he couldn't hear what she was saying.

James saw a pair of fat legs appear in front of his face, he immediately recognized the high quality material the Overseer's over sized vault suit was made out of. The overseer always got the highest quality stuff, be it food or living quarters, not even Amata got as high quality food and clothing as her father.

James's vision was almost completely gone by now, he could only whimper out a single word before he lost consciousness completely.

" _Why..."_

After that everything was black.

…

James eyes felt as if they had never been used before, his arms and legs felt like lead, and his head felt like someone was bringing a hammer to it every time it throbbed. James could feel something dripping from his nose, up his forehead, and into his hair, where it finally dripped onto the floor, and into a puddle below him.

James had only just noticed that he was hanging upside down in the middle of the Vault Atrium, there was no one there, and he could tell that it was lights out, seeing as too the lights were literally turned off.

James didn't notice a figure too his left until they threw something at him. James looked down, and was barely able to make out that something laying in the small pool of blood below him.

"A sweet roll?" James whispered dumbly, looking back to where it had come from.

This time, James immediately knew who was helping him.

"Butch, what the heck are you doing here?" James whispered, he didn't know why Butch was helping him, but he would welcome anyone's help at this point.

'Well anyone except Amata' James though with a pang hatred, he hadn't remembered until now, but the reason he was hanging upside down like a pig ready for the slaughter was that godforsaken girl.

"Shut the hell up James, we may not be friends, but we know messed up shit when we see it." Butch whispered back, sure, Butch was an asshole, always worried about himself and his little gang, but he wasn't inhuman either, when he had woken up that morning, he had opened the doors to his quarters just in time to witness one of the security officers, he couldn't tell who at the time, dragging an unconscious James through the hallway. The overseer, with pistol in hand, right behind them dragging a wailing and crying Amata. Butch followed with the small crowd of officers and residence with one question on his mind.

What in the fucking hell was going on?

Butch had followed the small crowd all the way to the Atrium, where he watched the Overseer himself string up James, just like he had seen when their class watched one of those old western holovids.

That night, Butch had talked with the Tunnel Snakes, and they all agreed that they had to help James. And so, after a long day of planning and stealing, here he was, pulling James too the second floor railing of the Atrium with a standing lamp.

"Why am I hanging upside down?" James asked, mind still cloudy from the sedative, he still felt like absolute garbage, and the feeling of betrayal was not helping in the slightest.

James was broken out of his internal musings as the second floor railing colliding with his head. Butch whispered a quiet apology, and pulled James so that the majority of his body was over the second floor of the Atrium.

James was surprised even further when he saw the other members of the gang emerge from the shadows holding a myriad of objects with them. Wally Mack carried with him a heavy suit of security armor, and an old M1911 handgun. Paul Hannon carried with him a backpack, and a small red messenger bag with a white cross.

However James was given no time to ask them why they were rescuing him Butch cut the rope that had been supporting him, and the floor decided it needed to have an important meeting with his face.

With much difficulty, and some help from Butch, James was back on his feet, abide barley.

"Butch, Wally, Paul? What the heck are you guys doing here?" James asked quietly, a definite tone of confusion in his voice.

The members of the Tunnel Snakes just looked at each other for a moment before Butch replied.

"James, I know we're not really friends and all, but I watched 'em sting you up there…" Butch paused, "And It just wasn't right."

The other two members of the gang nodded their heads in agreement.

"We gathered as much stuff for you as we could, Wally stole his dad's old gear, and Paul stole some stuff from the cafeteria and what's left of the infirmary." Butch said quietly, helping James into a doorway leading to the overseer's office.

"We even got the residential Vault nerd too help us out, Matt I think his name was, he did us a favor and hacked the Vault mainframe thingy, said that there is a secret tunnel under the overseer's desk that leads straight to the Vault door, you can use it to escape." Butch explained, stopping in front of the security office on the way to the Overseer's office. Paul went in and came out a couple of seconds later with a man James was _definitely_ not expecting too see.

It was Officer Gomez.

"Even old Gomez agreed the overseer is fucking crazy, and we can't agree on anything." Butch chuckled, as Officer Gomez exited the small office, dressed only in a light security vest and helmet, with nothing but a Baton at his side.

"Hey there champ, I- I'm really sorry about everything that's happened to you," Gomez paused as if having to swallow the situation that had transpired over the past twelve hours. "I promised your father I would take care of you kiddo." Gomez finished with a small pat too James's shoulder.

James just stood in the middle of the hallway, with the help of Butch, and took a moment for the past half a day to soak in.

So far he had been betrayed by his best friend, strung up in the Vault Atrium, rescued by his old bullies, and was about to leave the safety of the Vault for the first time in his entire life.

And he was _scared shitless_.

James however was pulled from his internal soaking by Butch, who slapped James's shoulder and lead him towards the door too the overseer's office, and his inevitable escape.

Gomez opened the door, making sure the coast was clear, before gesturing in the rest of the boys too enter the office.

Which might as well have been encrusted in diamond with how nice it looked. There were nice wooden floors, an almost perfectly preserved couch in the corner. There was even velvet curtains over the small circular window looking out into the Atrium, James was almost surprised to find that written on the window in black dry erase marker, were arrows and some, let's say not so nice words written next to said arrows, probably pointed to where James was dangling just a few minutes earlier.

Butch walked over to the light switch of the room, and flicked it on and off a few times, before turning it off once again. James was confused at Butch's random actions, until a tall buff man with glasses and a utility Vault suit walked into the room. James jumped at the sudden entrance of the unfamiliar face. Until butch walked up the guy and shook his hand.

"Thanks for doing this for me Matt." Butch said, Matt only responded with a grumble as he quickly made his way to the overseer's terminal and powered it on, causing a sickly green glow to cover most of the room.

James jumped at the sudden hiss of heavy hydraulics as the overseer's desk started raising up, revealing a secret staircase. It seemed like James was jumping at everything right now.

Butch looked at James and took of his Jacket, hanging it too James with a sincere smile.

"Here," Butch said with a genuine tone in his voice "Have my lucky jacket, You're gonna need all the luck you can get out there." he finished, James took the jacket and immediately slipped it on, it almost fit perfectly, abide it was a little larger on him, he was still thankful for the gift.

"Here's some armor, and I stole my dads piece, sorry, but I couldn't get a lot of ammo for it." Wally said, handing James the .45 auto and two boxes of ammo. James murmured a quiet 'thank you' as he accepted the handgun, donned the vest, and worked to strap the heavy pieces of kevlar into his limbs with some help from Wally. Paul them came forward and said his own piece.

"Hey, uhh, sorry for, ya know, bullying you 'n stuff." Paul said quietly, almost barely audible to anyone in the room. "I got ya some food 'n water, 'n a bunch of stims 'n rad stuff from the infirmary." Paul finished, handing James the black backpack, and red messenger bag, James again murmured a quiet 'thank you' and accepted the supplies.

"Sorry, but this is the farthest you guys can go," Matt said with a grumble, breaking the 'special moment' everyone was having, "There are cameras down there that I can't mess with, there encryption is way too strong for me too break." He finished before walking out of the room, only pausing for a moment too speak too James. "You be careful out there." Matt said too James, ending the conversation by leaving the room, and making James question if he had ever been there at all.

"Well, I guess this is goodbye James," Butch said with an almost sad tone in his voice, "If you ever get the chance, you should get a haircut." He chuckled at his own comment, Butch did always have a strange affinity with hair, that was something everyone in the Vault could agree on.

"Thanks for everything Butch, really, I'll be back someday." James said sadly, He felt almost like if things had gone another way, they might have been friends.

James took his leave from the group and stepped down the narrow staircase that rested below the Overseer's desk, James wasn't really surprised he had a secret tunnel, he had everything else in the world, so why the heck wouldn't he have a tunnel.

James stopped when he almost tripped over something he did not believe he would see down here of all places, sitting there, leaning against the wall right next to the escape elevator, was Amata, hugging a picture frame, her face stained in tears, and breathing low and steady.

James let out a low growl at seeing the face of his betrayer. It was almost as if she was put there as a last ditch effort at stopping him from leaving the Vault in case he escaped. James wouldn't have been surprised at such a cowardly tactic. However, as much as he hated her, burned into his memory was the horrified look on her face, curled up in the fetal position and crying her eyes out right before he passed out.

Deep down he knew she didn't want to hurt him, but he still couldn't help be feel anger and hatred towards her, James took a few steps towards the elevator leading to the Vault door, before turning around.

' _Even if I hated her I still loved her deep down, she's still family, and no matter what, family sticks together.'_ James thought glumly and pulled the picture frame out of Amata's hands.

James looked at the picture and smiled, it was from his tenth birthday, he had a trademark smirk on his face, and a black eye after fighting Butch for his sweet roll. Amata had frosting on her top lip almost resembling a mustache. The both of them were laughing and smiling, happy as can be.

James wished he could go back to that, back too when he had been smiling and happily playing with Amata in the Vault hallways, and keeping their minds distracted from the dangers of their lives.

However, James doubted whatever dangers that were in the Vault were anything in comparison to the things _outside_.

Pulling out the back of the picture frame, James took out the photo and put it in his Pip-Boy, where he decided to de-materialize his food, ammo, and medicine.

James made his way away from Amata, silent like a mouse, James opened the elevator, and pushed the button labeled 'Vault Door' and waited as the elevator rose to its destination, the door then opened with a small ding.

James simply left the elevator, walked over to an elevated yellow control panel with a plug, and a single red button. James pulled the plug from his Pip-Boy, and connected it to the console, his Pip-Boy flashed a message saying,

*Vault door cycling system initiated, would you like to continue? [Y] [N]*

James quickly selected Yes, and pushed the big red button, and with a screech resembling that of a Banshee on the hunt, and with that, the mighty door was opened once again.

James could feel the irradiated air of the outside world, it felt warm, almost as if he was standing closer to a fire than normal. It felt unnatural, yet it felt so liberating, so _freeing_.

And with his last though, James did what he had never thought he would ever do in his entire life.

James took the first step towards his own future…

 **A/N**

 **FLASHBACK CHAPTER!**

 **Hey there kiddos, how y'all been? Good, Bad, Finger licken' good?**

 **Either way, I brought you a new chapter! Now I know it's been a while, but I was really fighting my writer's block here, I've probably written four versions of this entire chapter, and let me tell you, It was a PAIN IN MY ASS.**

 **Anyways, I wanted this chapter to be a lot more about James, give him some more character development and such.**

 **Some of you might say things like "Hey, There's almost no cursing this chapter!" or "Hey, where's the comedy, I read this for the Humor!"**

 **Well there's a point too this chapter, and if you missed it, it's too show you James wasn't always the crazy vodka drinkn' bad ass we all know and love, In reality he's a lot more rounded, and In this story he will go through a few bouts of normalcy and the such.**

 **Anyways, thanks for reading my shity FanFiction, I've been TwoBearsMagee, and your watching Disney channel- Oh, wait, shit sorry wrong thing.**

 **Thanks for reading 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer', and I hope too see you guys here next chapter.**

 **OH, and before I forget, I'm still looking for an official Beta positions here, my tired brain can only catch so many errors. PM me if you're interested.**


	9. Chapter 8

**The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 8**

"J- James?" Velvet whispered, her face the image of shock and surprise.

She had walked into probably the strangest situation she had ever seen in her entire life.

James was sitting across from a whaling Yatsuhashi whom was clutching his broken arm. James looked like a ghost he was so white and shaking slightly as if he was sitting in a cold draft, his eyes as wide as saucers.

While James looked physically fine, Yatsuhashi looked almost the exact opposite, he was bright red, tears running down his face, and clutching his arm that had fallen limply at an unnatural angle, his aura began glowing and started to lessening the pain of the broken limb.

After Velvet noticed Yatsuhashi's broken limb, she sprang into action towards him and began pumping some of her aura into the wound in order to help stabilize the injury so that it wouldn't cause any lasting damage.

Velvet looked in James's direction and was surprised to find that while she was helping her teammate, he had somehow jumped from his chair and fallen into his stomach, his skin whiter than should be physically possible. It was like he had been covered in white paint, he was holding his head too the floor, and violently shaking as if he was freezing to death.

As soon as her eyes fell on James, Velvet sent an extra pulse of her aura at Yatsuhashi in order to decrease the pain in his broken forearm wiles she assisted her new friend.

Now if Velvet was being honest with herself, she would say she was scared, not really scared of James, but more afraid for his safety.

Velvet loved her team, and yes, she was mad at James, that's for damn sure. But he had also helped her with Cardin and his cronies at dinner, and the least she could do was not leave him broken on her dorm room floor.

Velvet was snapped out of her internal conflict by the sound of groaning from James's direction and Velvet made her final decision.

"Why do I have to be so nice to people." Velvet whispered questioningly to herself as she began wracking her brain on ways to wake up the unconscious teen.

And what better way to snap said teenager out of his unconscious state than to dump a bucket of ice water on him.

Now some might say that's a bit too cruel of a wake up call for someone, but he did break her partners arm, _plus I just like to watch James suffer._

"Oh you know you love me."

"Oh god damn it James, what the _FUCK_ did I say about the fourth wall, its an expensive piece of work that you keep breaking, and it's coming out of your paycheck."

"But I don't even get paid?"

"Exactly, anyways, let's get back too it shall we?"

A wave of Ice and water flew through the air in a snap and collided squarely with James's face, causing him to snap up into a sitting position and slam his forehead into the chair he was previously sitting on, causing him to bounce back and hit the back of his head on the carpeted flooring of Velvet's dorm.

Velvet would have smiled, maybe even laughed if it weren't for the current situation.

James sat up a second time, keeping an eye out for any rouge chairs, and looked around to get his bearings. He spotted two things almost immediately, first was a cute bunny girl standing over him with a worrying look on her face, and a dripping bucket at her side, and a large mountain of a man sitting at the table with a glowing arm, that also happened to be bent the opposite direction than should be normal.

" _Shit_ "

James wasn't really one for the whole fear thing, ya know, being the savior of the wastes and all.

However that didn't mean James was incapable of feeling fear, in fact he was very much born from it, everything he did in his life was in fear, in fear of his life, in fear of his next meal, and in fear of his home being threatened.

However right now, James was scared shitless for another reason, where there used to be a cute and helpless bunny girl, with a cute face, and ears.

Instead in her place there stood a threatening woman going through two things, anger, and

...

Worry?

...

James was normally a pretty good judge of emotion, but what he was seeing flash across Velvet's face was not what he expecting, in fact he expected her just to be angry, too just kick him out of her dorm and never speak to him again.

Instead here she stood, her face flashing between anger and worry, as if she was feeling conflicted within her own mind, conflicted on whether or not she should worry about and help him, or just kick him out for hurting her partner.

"J- James, d- did you hurt him on p- purpose?" Velvet whispered quietly, James wouldn't have heard her if his heart beating any louder in his chest.

"No," James shook his head with renewed vigor, "No it was an accident…" James finished, matching Velvet's whisper in fear of speaking too loudly.

"Y- Yatsu?" Velvet asked, turning to her injured teammate, "Is he telling the truth?"

Yatsuhashi took a moment to think, too assess how the last couple of minutes had gone before he answered.

"I approve."

James was taken aback by the surprising answer that Yatsuhashi gave them, no, surprised was an understatement, he was amazed by Yatsuhashi's answer.

Velvet was just about as equally amazed as James was judging from her look of disbelief, she stood there, ramrod straight as Yatsuhashi gave her a knowing look before she slowly turned around and looked James right in the eyes.

As soon as Velvet's gaze meet with James's, he snapped into action and rushed too Yatsuhashi.

Velvet gave a surprised look and opened her mouth in protest, but was silenced by James's finger finding a place on her lips.

The sudden touch from James caused Velvet too stop in her tracks, and her mind too go into overdrive, her lips were on fire and started to tingle in anticipation.

James however, was one hundred and one percent oblivious to the current images and fantasies flowing through Velvet's mind, her red face being noticed only by Yatsuhashi.

Too James, he was only telling her that he would fix everything he done, to her, it was a lot more than I'm willing to delve into.

Wile Velvet imagined scenarios that would make a porn star blush, James pulled his Pip-Boy close too his face and started skimming through his medical supplies, James smiled as he held out his hand as a flash of light enveloped it, a Stimpack re-materializing in his hand.

James calmly strode over to Yatsuhashi, who looked too James with admiration and surprise, right up until he felt a thin needle stab into his injured arm.

Yatsuhashi let out a small grunt as the Stimpack injected its contents into his arm, James murmured a small 'I'm sorry' about not warning him as the concoction of painkiller and healing agent immediately went to work mending the torn muscles and resetting the bone in preparation for the re-connection process. By the end of the evening, it would be as if his arm had never been broken at all.

Velvet broke out of her dazed state after hearing Yatsuhashi grunt at a needle being roughly stabbed into his arm, with a look of surprise and a hint of determination in her eye, Velvet leapt towards her partner and started inspecting his arm, watching as it slowly began to straighten out and the pained look on Yatsuhashi's face morphed into a look of absolute tranquility, as if all of his worries were washed away...

...Or as if someone had injected him with morphine.

Velvet looked at James with another conflicting look, one that many would call both a cross between admiration and intrigue, However, if James were being honest with himself, he would probably say something along the lines of, ' _fist me and call me you big daddy, that cute as shit!_ ', of course though, James didn't say anything like that, instead he just blushed and smiled, somehow still completely oblivious of the knowing looks coming from somehow still conscious Yatsuhashi.

"Thank you James, but how did you do that, what are you a miracle worker?" Velvet asked, giving James a light punch too the shoulder as she shot him a genuine smile.

James, being a sort of geek when it came too any and all of his equipment, whether it be weapon, clothing, or medical related, started off on a long tangent of the chemical makeup of Stimpacks and how he could manufacture more if he had the correct materials and a chemistry station.

However the contents of James's tangent will only be known by Velvet as Yatsuhashi finally gave in too unconsciousness after moving to his bed.

After about an hour of heavy discussion and excited copying of notes and information, James departed from the CFVY dorm room, leaving a content Velvet, an unconscious Yatsuhashi, and a suspicious glare coming from a smartly dressed student dragging around a cloudy eyed partner.

 **The Next Morning, Beacon Sparring Arena / Combat Classroom**

James looked out into the large crowd of students milling about the sparring arena's observation stands, many of them laughing and joking with each other, while a select few were sitting silently with there faces stuck into there scrolls either texting or watching stupid videos on the Net.

While James knew it was only his first day on the job as a combat instructor, he wanted to make a good impression on his students before he set a couple of ground rules, and just from a glance, he knew he was gonna have to heavily regulate the use of scrolls during his class time.

Another thing that will need James's immediate attention would have to be the lack of respect in the room, students were throwing things like paper airplanes and other smaller students.

James felt a new presence make itself known from behind him while he gazed out into the arena, the new presence was no doubt Glynda Goodwitch. As Ozpin had put it, he wanted her to assess his teaching ability, and see if he was indeed suitable to be a combat instructor.

James felt the presence behind him move too his side to reveal exactly whom he had expected, Glynda gazed upon James with a look of dis taint, as if he was nothing more than a splotch of mud on an otherwise perfectly waxed sports car.

"Do you really feel that you need too where that bulky armor?" Glynda asked, her eyes roving James's heavily armored body from head to toe.

The tell tale sound of hissing hydraulics was the only sound Glynda got in response from James as he turned his head to face her and removed his OD green helmet

"Of course Glynda, how else and I going to get there attention, so far they have only been taught by men and women to fight for the cameras, only pushing them too practice flashy moves and stupid mindsets of superiority," James paused and looked out onto the students again before returning his gaze too Glynda, "Instead of what's _really_ important too survive." James finished with a look of seriousness that looked out of place for his young age, it was a look of seriousness only achievable from years of experience in combat situations, fighting for your life, killing in order to survive.

Glynda's train of thought was interrupted by the hissing of James's hydraulics as he turned back towards the class and returned his helmet too his head,

"Today is the day that that changes." James said, his helmet distorting his voice and causing the hairs on Glynda's neck to stand up.

"Today they will learn what it means to be a real warrior."

 **A/N**

 **Hot diggity damn kiddos, it's been way too long, sorry about the wait, school, work, drama, and life got in the way and kept my attention for far longer than I had hoped, along with this chapter being a minefield of writer's block and OOC character interactions.**

 **If i'm gonna be honest, I don't like how this chapter went, it's too short, and it feels like a cop out filler chapter too me,**

 **But tell me what YOU think, what the reader thinks is TONS more important to me, I wanna know what you thought about this chapter, go on, Critique the shit out of my shitty ass writing, your reviews and opinions and ideas are what keep this story going.**

 **Anyhow, Thank you all for reading chapter eight of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer' and I hope too see you sexy bastards here next time.**

 **Also, still searching for an official Beta, PM me if you're interested, thanks all.**


	10. Chapter 9

**The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 9**

"Do you guys here that? What the hell is that noise?" The leader of team CFVY Coco Adel asked, her face distorting into a look of confusion as she looked around the room for whatever was making the strange hissing noise.

Coco's question caught the attention of some of the students around her as they too began listening for the offending sound.

Coco looked at the same entrance used by Goodwitch when she was in the class the year before, she and her team were in the class in order to assist the teacher to demonstrate more advanced attacks and defenses, which would be too difficult for any of the underclassmen.

Only the best teams of the previous year are allowed to assist in other classes, and them being there alone spoke volumes of there ability, alone and as a team.

However the first thing Coco noticed was that during her class the previous year, Goodwitch had never been late to class, in fact she was normally in the classroom before any of her students. The professor had always chastised any students that came in late by telling them they would be awoken the next day an hour after herself, the result was rather comical as the student ended up never sleeping at all, instead cleaning the entirety of the arena and helping Goodwitch with the mountain of paperwork that the crazier students that year had piled up from all of their pranks gone wrong.

Coco was pulled out of her thoughts by the sound of something crashing into the center of the arena, causing the entire room to shake, and some students to lose balance and fall to the ground.

As soon as the tremor concluded, all eyes were on the center of the arena where there stood a huge hulking humanoid form, shattered glass rained around it, covered in what looked like thick steel plates, the helmeted figure scanning the room and all of its occupants with an intimidating 'T' shaped visor.

The room seemed to pause in fear of the figure that had fallen into the arena through the skylight, a couple of students reached for there weapons, while others stood frozen in fear.

"I, am James Hardigan," 'James' stated, his helmet distorting his voice and adding a twang of static, "And I, will be your new combat instructor from now on."

At that the class's collective jaws dropped too the floor as 'James' began to pace around the arena, his hands behind his back, and his armor's hydraulic systems making a dull hissing sound every step he took.

"Now that I have introduced myself, out of you all, who is the most skilled student in this room?" James asked, his question surprised many in the room, however many of them unanimously agreed to hesitantly point at Pyhrra in fear of inciting James's wrath.

Pyrrha looked around in surprise and started waving her hands in front of her in order to deny their claims, but before she could say anything, she was interrupted by James.

"Than we will fight, and I will test just how skilled you really are." James stated with a nod, Pyhrra just nodded in defeat and made her way towards the arena.

James and Pyhrra positioned themselves across from each other, while Pyrrha adopted a low crouching combat stance, James pulled a long serrated sword off of his hip and stood casually. Both of the fighters stood at the ready and sized each other up. Pyrrha looked up and down at James and nodded her head in acceptance, her mind taking note that his entire body was covered in a thick layer of steel as she formed an intricate plan in her mind to defeat him.

James looked on at Pyrrha and smiled wickedly, James had come across Pyrrha's file the night before, and too say the least, he was not impressed, in his opinion her moves were too flashy and she always had mercy on her opponents, it confused him, she was such a good fighter, but in the end she always let them live, he reminded himself too ask her in the future.

The two stood and studied each other carefully for a couple of seconds, waiting for the other to make the first move.

As surprising as it may have been, it was Pyrrha who had taken the initiative and attacked, bounding straight for James as she transformed Akoúo̱ into it's Javelin form and threw it at James in hope of distracting him so that she could shield bash him.

Now if James weren't in his armor, he could have easily dodged the throw like a paper airplane, However with the bulkiness of power armor, he had to take the brunt of the damage and ended up with a Javelin embedded inside of the servos of his right arm, effectively putting his dominant arm out of commission.

James commended Pyrrha on her tactically sound move to disarm him as he yanked the weapon from his armor and threw it too the ground. Her plan would have worked if he hadn't have been ambidextrous, after having his dominant arm broken in the middle of firefights, James Learned to fight with both hands quickly.

James began backing up as Pyrrha jumped high in the air in hopes of getting an advantage on her opponent, an attack from above of sorts.

Pyrrha flipped in mid air and nailed a flashy three point landing, with shield in hand, however as soon as she landed she felt the presence of a strange metal disk near her and looked down at the ground in front of her. Only to be greeted by a flashing orange light and a rapid beeping that she somehow not heard in the process of her jump.

It was safe to assumption that the disk was dangerous, so Pyrrha made for a bound to safety in hopes of getting away from it and assessing her situation. She was just a few feet from the disk as it exploded into a ginormous ball of blue electricity. The ball caught her right at the edge of the mine's radius and pumped just a little under 50,000 Volts into her body, causing all of the muscles to tense up, effectively putting her out of the fight in seconds..

Pyrrha fell to the ground with her eyes screwed shut as she cried out in pain, the class gasped in surprise as James held up a single fist to silence them.

James walked up too where Pyrrha laid and assisted her too her feet and back to her seat before moving back to the center of the arena to finish his first and most important lesson.

"What you have just witnessed here today, was a rookie mistake." James said loudly, causing both teams RWBY and JNPR too look at James with surprise, and a select few in anger. *Cough* Jaune *Cough*.

"Ms. Nikos did a flip in mid air, which allowed me the time to plant surprise at her landing point," James paused to let the information sink in, "Had she not been flashy with her jump she would have had the chance to defeated me with some extra effort."

The majority of the class had looks of surprise etched on their faces, mainly because the great Pyrrha Nikos had just been defeated, and by something that seemed so simple.

However Pyrrha did not hold a similar look to the other students, instead she held a small smile on her face as she nodded her head in appreciation, many in the room would think Pyrrha would feel annoyed or upset at the fight, instead Pyrrha felt exactly the opposite, in fact she felt happy that someone had finally shown everyone that she wasn't as untouchable as everyone thought, that she too could made mistakes and learn more.

"Not one of you are invincible, and not one of you are gonna be able to defeat me any time this year. So buckle up buttercups, You're gonna go on a _of ass kicking and BULLSHIT!"_ James finished with a yell, causing the entire class too erupted in laughs at the prospect of the giant steel plated man whom had been so serious at the beginning of class, had actually been a cliché idiot the entire time.

James pulled off his helmet and looked at his new class with his own bright blue eyes, his short black hair covered in sweat with a large smile on his face.

"This success calls for a drink!" James quietly whispered to himself, opening a pouch on the side of his armor to reveal a comically small bottle of whisky for James's power armored hands, a comically small bottle of whisky that he immediately popped the top off of and chugged with vigor before beginning his walk to the arena's exit.

"Oh, and class is dismissed, don't die over the weekend" James said waving his hand above his head while his other hand reached for another comically small bottle of whisky. _Seriously where are all of these coming from?_

James's statement caused the entire class to begin standing up and begin making for the same exit he was.

Until of course he was stopped by an adorable voice he recognized call his name from behind him.

"James, wait up!" Velvet yelled as she ran in his direction, Yatsuhashi and a guy and girl he didn't recognize following shortly after her.

"Oh, hey Vel, what can I do for ya?" James asked as he turned around to face the bunny faunus and took a large gulp from his new tiny as shit whisky bottle before it was nimbly snatched out of his hands.

"You know this will kill you?" Velvet asked with a faint hint of sadness in her voice, "Promise you'll stop?" she asked, her ears drooping over her back as she looked at him with Puppy eyes? or Bunny eyes? Aww hell I don't know, this is way above my pay grade man.

James groaned as he stared at the adorable face in front of him, as he through through his few options.

Option one was get shit faced, But never having a chance with Velvet, but option two was drink only in his room and have a shot at getting with Velvet. A hard choice for James as he was normally one hundred and ten percent drunk at all times.

James made up his mind as he lowered his head and smiled at Velvet.

"You know I can't say no to that face." James said, causing Velvet too giggle adorably, Yatsuhashi too shiver in fear, and Coco and and Fox's eyes to widen in shock. Would Fox still widen his eyes, I feel like he would, again, this is way above my pay grade.

"Good," Velvet said with an excited smile, "you should come and have dinner with my team and I, It's Fajita Friday™, and Fox makes the best Fajitas!." she explained with a small hop of excitement.

"I'd Love too Vel." James said, smiling cheerfully back at Velvet, he normally wasn't this cheerful, but Velvet's attitude just seemed to ooze out happiness and make him smile like a bloody idiot.

"Awesome, Come to my dorm at seven,' Velvet said, grabbing the hand of Coco as she pulled her confused team leader out of sight before she could object and break down her plans.

James's oblivious smile immediately shrunk into an awkward one as soon as Velvet and her team left the room.

Glynda walked up to James's flank and placed a hand on his shoulder while adopting a look of both anger and warning, her eye twitching every couple of seconds, James was able to easily decrypted the message behind the look.

It was a ' _Good luck, but do anything unethical and i'll hunt you down and murder your balls off.'_ kind of look if he had ever seen one.

James nervously chuckled at the look and began booking it too the student garage in order to store his power armor and repair the damage to the servo system as soon as he could.

' _Maybe I should make myself look a little more presentable.'_ James thought to himself as he strode through the hallways toward his destination.

 **A/N**

 **WHAT'S THIS? Two chapters in one week, how absurd am I right?**

 **But really, last chapter caught me in a hole of writer's block and depressing shit, but I crawled out of it and came out with ideas galore. While it was some work, and Nuka world took my attention more than a few times, here it is, the second fight scene, James Vs. Pyrrha, a fight of wits and stupid ass bullshit flips, I wanted James to not be super OP, but Pyrrha was taught to fight for the cameras.**

 **At least that's just my opinion.**

 **Now some might say "Well of course Pyhrra doesn't kill it's only a tournament." Just remember that the dense as fuck James still hasn't realized he's in another world, because he's a fucking idiot, and all the tournaments he has ever encountered in the wasteland were things like The Pitt, and The Thorn. Which we all know, aren't exactly the nicest places in the world.**

 **Oh, and James has a hot date, and Glynda is gonna be hovering over his shoulder? Next chapter is gonna be a bit of a cool down chapter, more of that comedy You all know and love.**

 **Anyhow, Thanks for reading and I hope too see you here for the next chapter of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer', Peace.**

 **Oh, and again, If there is anyone who would like to be my official BETA reader, that would be much appreciated, I try hard to revise this story, but one pair of eyes can only do so much.**


	11. Chapter 10

**The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 10**

'James'

It started out as just a whisper.

'James'

It was just a little bit louder this time, but he couldn't quite make out the voice.

"James"

The voice sounded familiar, he felt like he had heard it before, but he couldn't quite make it out just yet, the answer was on the tip of his tongue.

"James"

"What?' James squeaked out, his voice slurred and his, movement subdued. He was never much of a morning person.

"JAMES"

James bolted from his bed, his face covered in sweat, and his breath shaky. He wiped his forehead with the palm of his hand as he fell back into his bed, his head making contact with his sweat covered pillowcase.

"Fuckin' hell," James growled to himself, his voice groggy as he attempted to get himself out of bed.

"JAMES HARDIGAN" he cringed as the shrill voice of professor Glynda Goodwitch pounded on his door, forcing the wanderer to stand up and face his fears, ie. his students.

'This place is making me into a lazy ass." James remarked to himself as he sat up again, albeit slowly, and looked at the flashing blue glow emanating from his wrist.

"God damned old world tech," James said as he closed out the strange pop up that had been plaguing his device every five goddamned minutes in this new place. Frankly James was starting to wish he could take it off and smash it with a baseball bat.

James started scrolling through his apparel, he had class today, and he couldn't wear anything too intimidating by the orders of Tits Magee. besides, he still hadn't quite made the time to repair the damage to his Power armor that that damned red haired girl made.

It had been about a week since his first lesson as a teacher at Beacon, it was easy for him, almost too easy, he always expected someone to show up demanding that he 'Must pay for destroying America' or some shit like that, but the only real insult he got nowadays was his inability to consume alcoholic beverages.

Don't get him wrong, James loved alcohol to death, but something about Velvet just made him feel, strange, something he had never felt before.

That scared the living shit out of James too.

He had been to almost every corner of the old world, been into every military installation with the brotherhood, every inch of DC with Reilly and her team, and every mountain range with the NCR Rangers. But never in James's long and bloody life had he ever experienced something like this. It made his question everything he had ever known.

Well nearly everything, he still fucking despised radios.

*KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK*

"JAMES YOU ARE LATE" Glynda half whispered half yelled through James's door, she was clearly perturbed at him and if he didn't get a move on soon, he ran the risk of having to replace his door for the third time this week.

"Jesus fucken hell Tits, give me a minute to breath will you?" James remarked back, just loud enough that Glynda would hear him, the only answer he got back was the barely discernible sound of the Headmistress giving out a heavy sigh.

James stood up from his bed and smiled victoriously, he looked back at his Pip-Boy again, and decided on his tan combat pants and boots, with one of his newly acquired shirts, a red plaid shirt, and his old red baseball cap, the one that Stanly gave to him on his tenth birthday.

*knock knock knock*

This time the knocks were softer than before, apparently, Glynda was starting to get the gist, James opened his door, and his cocky smirk disappeared immediately.

There stood, in his view, a set of brown bunny ears, James groaned internally, all week Velvet had been walking with him to class, neither of them ever talked to each other, the most words shared between them lately had been a simple 'Hello' or James telling her to go and help another student that was having trouble in combat class.

He still felt bad too, he had told her he could attend her little team pow, wow, but then he was called up to Ozzy's office and given a nice scolding, which he proceeded to ignore.

He had only picked up small portions of the speech anyways, 'Bla Bla Bla, Don't electrocute your students, Bla Bla Bla.' Real boring stuff is he was being honest.

Back to the subject, James had been so mentally drained from the scolding, that he had completely forgotten about Velvet and her team's invitation to eat dinner, and he didn't attend, like the giant asshat that he was.

Long story short, James fucked up.

Real bad.

However, the positive side was apparently, Velvet didn't hate his guts and still enjoyed hanging out with him, even if there was always an awkward silence.

James was snapped out of his guilt filled internal musings by Velvet speaking, "Good morning James"

"Morning Velvet," James whispered silently, stepping out of his room and locking it behind him with his Pip-Boy. He had installed his Scroll into his Pip-Boy the night before, which just happened to be the first night he actually had some free time from, don't get him wrong, James was starting to love this whole teaching thing.

As surprising as that was to himself, he had always thought he would live and die, defeating evil and protecting the innocent, but apparently, he was also partial to teaching a bunch of fuck tards how to properly communicate in a war zone.

"You're doing great James, just don't give up." Velvet said with an almost perfect smile on her face.

James turned around before giving Velvet his best smile and speaking, "Thanks, Vel, that means a lot."

James faced the door, and with renewed vigor, kicked it open and began his morning training session.

"ALRIGHT FUCK STICKS, WEAPONS IN THE PILE, ITS TIME TO GET TO WORK YOU GOOD FOR NOTHING-" James froze, and began looking over the over 2,000 eyes that were not on him.

James glanced at the door and recognized a sign in the middle of the door that said, 'Do Not Enter Under any Circumstances, Parent Conference in Progress.'

A single drop of sweat dropped off of James's face before he turned around and found himself face to face with Velvet, the perfect smile was now twisted into an evil grin, a grin of someone who knows exactly where she had led the absent-minded James.

Right into a trap.

"Good luck James" Velvet said, her evil grin remaining on her face as she slammed the door on him.

James heard the click of the dead bolt in the door, and he was effectively locked inside of the conference unless of course, he felt like paying for another door, Which he sure as hell wasn't going to be able to do with his extremely limited funds as of recently

James gulped loudly and slowly turned around to face a large number of parents.

He swore he could hear his own bones creak as he slowly pivoted on his foot and face to face with the one and only Headmaster.

He jumped up in surprise as Ozpin took a long sip from his mug and spoke, "Why hello James, I'm glad you weren't late, although I had hoped that you would have chosen a more," He coughed, "Discreet entrance method."

"I'm supposed to be here?" James quietly whispered out, his face still contorted in horror as he was a stared down by about 2,000 angry parents.

"Why yes James, You were to introduce yourself to the parents and tell them of your future lesson plans, didn't your students tell you?" Ozpin asked, a small smile on his face and he handed James a napkin with the words 'It was the bunny girl, I had no choice' written on it.

James stared at the napkin for a moment before steeling his resolve and beginning his walk into the middle of the meeting room.

He was gonna play this off really smooth.

James took in a deep breath before picking up a microphone and speaking. "Or at least that's what I would have said if I was some crazy guy picked up out of the forest!"

He laughed nervously as the crowd started murmuring to themselves, there was a moment of tense silence until someone in the crowd started laughing.

It was a large woman with bright red hair dressed in a red and brown tunic reminiscent of ancient Greece.

She had an extremely manly laugh.

"You seem like a great influence for our future Huntsman and Huntresses, even heard that You beat our daughter the first day of work?" The woman asked heartily, although she looked eerily familiar, almost like a certain amazonian Huntress-in-training student of his, just with the muscle mass slider set to max.

"Yes Mrs. Nikos, Mr. Hardigan is a highly trained teacher, he used to live out in the Grimlands before he began working here," Ozpin said, James handed the headmaster a flask of the last of his whiskey and Oz pin proceeded to pour it into his mug discreetly before handing it back to James.

"My daughter told me formally that this 'New teacher' of hers was a drunken old man from the outer colonies? Are, these accusations true Headmaster?" A man with pure white hair said, his voice barely being audible through the almost impenetrable wall of bodyguards that surrounded him in his seat.

Before Ozpin could respond, however, James beat him to the punch.

"Well hey now, I am NOT an old man, and I _definitely_ don't have a" James stopped to take a sip from his flask, "I don't have a drinking problem!" James finished, his sentence punctuated with a burp.

All Jacques could do was stare blankly at James through the shoulders of his bodyguards before he responded.

"Ozpin I demand you fire this insolent old man before he ruins our children." He said, a straight face all throughout the sentence as he completely disregarded James as a whole.

"I'm afraid I cannot do that Mr. Schnee, He is an extremely valuable member of not just the teaching staff, but also the security staff. He is here whether you like it or not." Ozpin said, his mug, 100% NOT spiked with whiskey, assisting him in dealing with the current issue at hand.

"How about a contest to see whether he is worthy of a spot here?" Someone spoke out from the crowd of parents, no doubt a non-Huntsman parent hoping to see a show.

"Yea, that's a great idea!" someone else shouted out until the entire room was buzzing with the prospect of seeing if this 'Mr. Hardigan' was as strong as Ozpin said he was.

"Mr. Hardigan, Please indulge the conference with a demonstration of your armor," Ozpin said with an undertone of stress in his voice before whispering just loud enough or James to hear him, "Just get it over with ok? nothing too fancy."

"Of course Ozzy!" James laughed before walking over to the door and trying to open it. only to find that it was still locked from the outside.

James walked back to the Headmaster to ask him an essential question.

"Do I have to pay for the door this time?" He asked, a hopeful smile on his face.

"No James, all damages in the next half hour will be covered by the school board," Ozpin said, "Just don't destroy the entire campus please."

James smile grew into a large evil grin as he walked up to the door and decided to give the crowd a taste of his strength by punching the door down.

*CRACK*

James looked down to see that his head was hanging limply at the wrist and looked as if it was broken.

Which just so happened to be the exact issue.

"Oh fuck you too, ya fucking doory piece of shit," he said, atomizing Hunting shotgun and a stimpack in a flash of blue light. "I'll show you a pain in the ass."

James injected the stimpack into his wrist and watched as he began to gain control of his extremity again in a matter of seconds. Once he had full control back, locked the pump of his shotgun back and pulled out a handful of bright green shells with the depiction of a dragon breathing fire on them.

James loaded two of the shells and racked the weapon before leveling its barrel at the double door and firing one shot into each of the oaken barriers.

The moment the plasma infused slugs made contact with the wood, the doors began to eat away atom after atom of the door structure until the only thing left was a large pile of green goo where two artfully crafted doors used to be.

The crowd was so shocked at this that they didn't make a sound, they just started to stare deftly at the retreating figure of James as he walked over the pool of plasma dramatically.

However as soon as he was out of sight, he began frantically hopping up and down and trying to get his, now bubbling and smoking, boots off as fast as humanly possible.

The last sounds the concerned and worried parents heard from James was the sound of gunfire and one phrase echoing through the hallways.

"I FUCKING HATE RADIOS!"

 **A/N**

YES, a new chapter! I am so sorry for the delays on this chapter, and I know it's a bit lackluster, but if you are following me as an author you will know that I have published a second story!

Yay!

It's a more serious RWBY OC story, called 'Hunters of Fortune', check it out if you want, It could really use some more support!

Moving on from my own blatant self-advertising, this chapter! It was a pain, and it really is more like just a filler chapter, but I have some plans for this story, along with quite a few nice twists.

and I hope to hell that you all stay to enjoy it!

Now on to some pretty interesting guest reviews!

Stuka - You, my friend, you have my gratitude, I had an extremely large bout of writer's block before your review gave me the push I needed to write this chapter, So I sincerely thank you, and I'll have to invest in some Ninja repellant in the future.

Guest - Yes I know in canon that The Lone Wanderer is 19, but I decided to tweak when he left Vault 101 in order to give me more options later on in the story.

Guest - I tried to make it clear at the beginning that James was a Tale of Two Wastelands character, if you are unfamiliar with the mod I suggest you look it up, It is extremely fun.

outcast ranger - No she didn't my friend, no she didn't.

I would just like to extend my thanks to everyone who has supported this story, It's been hard for me to keep writing these past weeks due to some personal life issues, but to all those who have left a review, and have helped me in some way with this story, you have my thanks, you are all amazing and I couldn't have asked for a better reading audience, and I won't stop writing no matter what as long as I have an audience who enjoys it!


	12. Chapter 11

The Ghosts of a Wanderer - Chapter 11

James found himself in what he would call another predicament.

Again.

Nothing too bad, no one is killing anyone, and he had successfully gotten his boots off before the plasma decided to melt his feet off, so that was a plus.

No, instead James found himself staring at a full suit of power armor.

Sure he thought it was his, but instead of seeing the familiar form of dark green and black, James found himself staring at a dark grey set of power armor with yellow stripes down the two shoulders, a red crest in the shape of a four-leaf clover with the words 'Riles Rangers' written on his left pauldron in the center of the yellow stripe, making it pop.

It didn't take him long to know exactly who had repainted his armor, but he didn't have time to deal with that now, in fact, he had a huge group of concerned parents to please.

James sighed and made his way to the rear of his armor, a small flash of blue accentuated the rematerialization of a fusion core.

He inserted the core with a slam of his fist and with a turn of the entrance valve, he watched the rear of his beloved armor open with a hiss. As soon as that was done, James climbed into the armor and hit a button on his left hand that was used to close the armor back up.

Now encased in his power armor, James braced for the amount of difficulty his right servo unit would give him but found that it didn't give him any resistance, in fact, his right arm seemed to move as if he weren't wearing a ton of armor on his arm.

James smiled as he realized what had happened, Ruby must not just have repainted his armor but also done repairs on them while he was away.

Unable to suppress his uplifted mood, James picked up his helmet from his workbench and found a note tucked beneath it. It was addressed to him, with a red rose crest sealing the envelope.

James decided to save the note for later and tucked it into one of the many pouches that adorn his armor before placing his helmet on his head and making his way out of the garage.

The crowd of murmuring parents began to quiet as they began to hear a rumbling sound coming from the hallway.

Both Glynda and Ozpin looked at each other and sighed, knowing full well that they would have to run damage control if- no when James went overboard while fighting the parents.

"This was a horrible idea Ozpin, what is the point of introducing them to Mr. Hardigan of all our staff, even Professor Port would have been a better choice!" The middle ages headmistress said annoyance clear in her voice as she let her arms fly up in exasperation.

"Because if he does well we will have students booked for the next 4 years." Ozpin whispered back with a slight smirk on his face, "If he pulls it off right, these parents will tell their friends, and then their friends until we have students indefinitely!"

Glynda couldn't believe her ears, Ozpin was using James as advertising.

And she thought James we crazy.

Before she could even try to protest Ozpin's absurd plan, James entered, donning his hulking suit of,

Grey armor?

She was surprised to see that instead of wearing his intimidating militaristic green armor, his armor had been repainted with the colors of the Beacon Guard, his shoulder pauldrons adorn with yellow highlights and a familiar crest on his right shoulder in red.

it was clear that the young reaper had done some modifications to James's suit, either with, or without his permission.

Ozpin smiled and began to speak, "Ah, Mr. Hardigan, Welcome back, I pray that your armor is ready for the demonstration?"

"Yes, Headmaster," James said, his teeth grinding together in frustration, as much as he began to enjoy teaching his students, Ozpin always found a way to fuck with him.

"Good!" Ozpin said, his smile unwavering as he turned and faced the parents before speaking again in a slightly heightened tone, "If you have a weapon with you today, please stand up and make your way here."

James's eyes widened as he realized what the Headmaster had planned for him, he inwardly cringed and decided that instead of giving Ruby a firm talking too, he would ask her to assist him in the upcoming repair fest that would no doubt be the result him being the target during a surprise shooting contest.

"Now we only have time for one fight before the conference is over, you will be testing Mr. Hardigan's defenses for five minutes each, if you can penetrate his armor, I will terminate his contract and find a suitable replacement immediately."

'Are you fucking kidding me.' James thought to himself as he sagged his shoulders in his armor before bracing himself for the incoming torrent of firepower that would no doubt wreck havoc on his servos and sensors.

As soon as what the Headmaster finished speaking, a little less than half of the parents in the crowd stood up and began making their way to a separate crowd on the main stage.

James looked across the way and felt as if he were looking down the barrel of Maria again, only this time Maria was a crowd of angry parents brandishing weapons of death and destruction.

One man in the crowd tightly held a large broad sword that burst into flames when he thumbed a button on the hilt and a woman next to him held a rifle that looked as if it should have been mounted on one his humvee.

A large bead of sweat ran down James's forehead as the woman holding the large rifle looked at him and sent him an evil smile that sent a shiver down his spine.

"Now, who wishes to try be the one to beat James into unemployment?" Ozpin asked, making James cringe internally and curse both Ozpin and his future children in the afterlife.

Ozpin was about to chose the woman with the evil grin, but to James's relief, a tall, lightly tanned, blond man pushed his way through the crowds brandishing his fists and pushing other parents out of his way without care, all whilst yelling incoherent sentences strung together with what James could only call 'Unmentionable words'

Otherwise known as asking people to move and apologizing after bumping into other parents in a polite indoor voice.

"Ahhh, Mr. Xiao Long, you no doubt wish to fight young James here correct?" Ozpin asked, in a surprisingly spiteful voice that unnerved James to no end.

'It's almost like he knows I'm gonna lose or something.' James thought to himself in a deadpan tone.

"Why yes Headmaster, that is indubitably why I have come here." Mr. Xio Long said, his voice poise and proper, James was confused at this, this guy looked more like some sort of barbarian with his skin and the large black shoulder tattoo he had.

This guy reeked of bullshit.

"Then move into the ring and we will begin the fight shortly," Ozpin said quickly, ushering both James and his challenger into the middle of the room and drawing a large circle around us both with a piece of white chalk.

"Wait, Haven't I heard Xiao Long somewhere before?" James asked himself aloud, his voice slightly modulated by his helmets, external speakers.

However, James was surprised when he got an answer, by no other than his opponent, who wore a shit-eating smug ass motherfucking face.

James fucking hated this guy already.

"Yea, My daughters are Yang Xiao Long and Ruby Rose." The man said, causing James to freeze and bring both his hands up to cover his mouth with an overly dramatic gasp.

"I know them! Isn't this neat? Ya know, Ruby helped to repair this armor, probably not even an hour ago? She even gave me this note!" James said in his happiest and excitable tone, all while jumping up and down, and pulling out the note to show the emblem of a red rose stamping the envelope closed.

As soon as James pulled the emblem into view Taiyang jumped into action and punched James right in the face- er, helmet, causing him to snap his head back, and become deathly silent and still.

Taiyang cradled his pained hand before looking back at James, only instead of seeing a crazy little kid playing with armor they shouldn't have, he saw the image of a trained and seasoned veteran huntsman, the 'T' visor in his helmet burning a hole into his soul and causing his eyes to go wide.

"Now that was just rude," James said slowly barely a whisper over the sound of Taiyang rapidly beating heart, he swore if anyone were closer to the pair, they too would have heard the rapid thumping of his fear stricken heart.

then, with a bolt of inhuman speed and almost unhindered agility, James threw a punch, with Tai only just barely dodging by the skin of his teeth.

Tai was shocked, to say the least, he thought he would have the advantage of speed and agility, but with that gone, he wasn't sure he even had a chance against that, that *thing*.

"Fuck you" Tai hissed, his hope renewed after dwelling on his recently dodged right hook, he could do this, just like he always did, there was nothing he couldn't overcome if he just pushed through it with raw power and his raw fortitude.

That was the last thing to go through Tai's mind before a large power armored gauntlet decided it wanted to make a place for itself directly in the center of Tai's cheek. Knocking him out and on his ass, causing the rest of the parents to gape at the surprise that the infamous flame dragon going down in one punch.

All eyes were on James now, he was just standing there, still extended from his recent fight winning punch, and remained there 100% still as a statue.

Like some weird alcoholic face punching statue of death and destruction.

James remained still for a couple more seconds before standing up ramrod straight, his helmet masking the huge shit eating grin plastered over his face after punching out what he liked to call a 'cocky son of a bitchface'

"Ya'll all think too much," James yelled out suddenly while turning around and walking calmly out of the auditorium, his thundering steps continuing to reverberate throughout the steel struts of the building long after he was gone.

"Well everyone, it was nice speaking with you all, but it seems were out of time for today," Ozpin said with a small smile on his face, however on the inside he was laughing like a maniacal villain. His plan to get revenge on Taiyang has finally succeeded, THATS WHAT YOU GET FOR STEELING MY COFFEE!

A/N

Hey, ya'll!

Sorry about the hole, 'Let's wait three months before posting' thing, but I was a bit busy, I have begun trying to get into contact with my nearby Air Force recruiter so that I can talk to them about joining as a Security Forces Specialist.

On another note, it's 2017, Woohoo! New year same old slow posting me.

Also, I've recently bought Skyrim Remastered, and I've fallen in love, like seriously, why the fuck have I never played it before? I don't know, all I know is that I'm getting tired of making fucking iron daggers.

Anyhow, thank you all for sticking around with me this fine new year, and I hope to keep writing content for this story as long as I am alive, or ya know, not brain dead.

See you all new chapter! thanks for coming! If you don't come to the next chapter I'll eat your cat!


	13. Chapter 12

The Ghosts of a Wanderer Chapter 12

James fell into his couch as if he were falling into the embrace of a long-lost lover.

ie, by jumping face first into the couch with a bottle of liquor in one hand and a handgun in the other.

However with the joy of his beloved couch, came a dilemma that he wasn't sure he was ready for.

James sat up on his couch, he looked at his left hand, a bottle of Mistral bourbon being deftly cradled by his fingers.

Ok maybe I'm exaggerating, he was holding onto the bottle with an iron grip, his knuckles white, almost like he was afraid the bottle would be ripped away from his at any moment, only not by the cruel god that was the author, but by his own care for a certain bunny haired faunus.

it would be an understatement to say that he was torn.

On one hand, he could get fucken hammered and forget all about the atrocities committed against him by the very same bunny girl, or he could give it all up, and possibly have a chance at getting with her.

However before he even had the chance to have a character developing moment, the bottle was already at his lips, the amber liquid rolling down his throat with a satisfying burn.

All of James's problems seemed to wash away with the bourbon in that moment, he wasn't worried about a single god damned thing.

Not his strange attraction to a brunette bunny, nor the anger at Ozpin for losing his HUMVEE, not the feeling of anger towards Ruby for fucking up his armor, even if it was an upgrade, and James definitely didn't notice two other things, however, these things were not issues, but more objects in his room that he was just far too drunk to notice.

Everything just seemed to be perfect.

of course, that's not what he would be thinking tomorrow morning, but hey, you take what you can get right?

Unknown Location

"Sir, the Brotherhood Paladin has just retired to his quarters." A comms ensign said to his CO.

Said CO just happened to be the original Colonel of Sensor Base Epsilon, he had been moved on from ground side service and shoved into the rank of Vice Admiral in the Enclave Navy after his quick thinking, and the capture of Brotherhood assets in Mt. Glenn.

"And his power armor?" The now Admiral said in return to his ensign.

"It's currently in a separate, and rarely used building sir." responded the Ensign with practiced fluency, his voice clear and crisp.

"Send in a procurement team, make it small, no power armor, low profile," the admiral ordered, a small malicious grin adorning his face, "I want that armor by the end of the day, or it's your head Ensign Gordon."

"Yes sir," Gordon said with an audible gulp and began typing rapidly into his console, not only his job was on the line, but his life as well.

Beacon Guard Surveillance Office - Three Hours Later

One of the many Beacon Guard employees was sitting at his desk, A set of gray and yellow Atlesian combat armor firmly fitting his form and a pistol grip dust shotgun sitting on a rack of other assorted firearms, half of them missing, probably in the hands of the Night Patrolmen making their early evening rounds.

The Guardsman glanced at the large number of CCTV screens in front of him, the cameras were placed in strategic locations all around campus to detect both Grimm attacks, and the occasional lovestruck couple who think they can sneak out to vale for a steamy night of [BLEEP] you know how they are nowadays, always [BLEEP]ing and trying to [BLEEP] out wherever they could [BLEEP]

However, after inspecting the forest landscape on one of the outermost lower cliffside cameras used mostly to keep an eye on a small concrete outcropping and a pair of thick steel keycard doors at the bottom of the cliff used by Guardsmen to patrol the border of the Emerald forest and Beacon's grounds.

Right before he moved on to the next camera he noticed something he didn't before, a shimmer of light, it reminded him of when he was younger and would see mirages in the distance on an extremely hot day.

The Guardsman's interest was piqued at this point, and so he zoomed in a bit to see what almost looked like the shadow of a person, scratch that, multiple persons.

If he was being honest, the Guardsman wasn't even sure if he was seeing things, or he was a side character in some sort of horrible death scene.

He was answered less than a second later by pain blooming in his chest, looking down, he was created to the image of a mat black blade materializing from thin air.

Blade in his back, and his vision becoming dark, the Guardsman dropped to his knees and started crawling for his weapon, his hand less than a few inches from his shotgun when a lead slug buried itself into his skull, killing the Guard and blowing the front of his helmet off, grey matter spraying the floor as blood began pooling beneath him.

Just then, the Guardsman's chair moved as if someone had plopped down into it casually, and a man appeared to materialize out of thin air, his body covered in what looked to be pitch black combat armor plates and a black balaclava, the only hint of color was the dull yellow 'E' surrounded by 12 equally yellow stars positioned on the left side of the onyx chest plate.

A black gloved hand went up to the ear of the balaclava and a deep raspy voice began to speak into an unseen radio.

"Menace 1-5 in position." the man said, his fingers flying over the keyboard, shutting down cameras by the dozen, leaving his comrades more room to maneuver onto academy grounds and procure the package unseen.

'Menace 1-5' as he called himself was distracted by the sound of a door opening, a small childlike gasp, and the sound of something impacting the ground. When he turned around, his eyes meet a variable no one is ever prepared to combat.

A small girl, in a crimson hood.

A/N

CLIFFHANGER MOTHERFUCKERS! HA HA!

*ahem*

Sorry about that my friends, not really a comedic chapter, but more a chapter to start off with the actual plot I have kinda, sorta, planned. so far I've had fun writing this as a comedic bullshit story, but it's about time we start off on the real shit.

The intense shit if you will.

Also, my current beta may or may not be dead, I have no idea as he has not responded to any of my emails for the past few months, so I'm currently in the market for a new one, throw me a PM if you're interested.

And lastly, I'd like to thank everyone who drops me a review, seriously, reviews have the mystical ability to kick me off of my lazy ass and get me writing.

Now to respond to a couple of Guest reviews!

Axcel - (Chapter 2) I would like to point out, that yes, the BOS are indeed made up mostly of military personnel and their families, the Enclave is made up of the ancestors of some of the most important people from pre-war America.

It would make sense that those extremely powerful and wealthy individuals would have the best of the best to protect and serve for the future US government. As well as the experience, even if it was negative, from the Poseidon Oil Rig incident, I believe the Enclave would be hard pressed to not evolve into a deadly fighting force, no matter how small.

(Chapter 9) Yes I know that power armor slows down a normal person's reaction, but with a master of mechanics like Ruby performing maintenance and improvements for an unknown amount of time, the armor could be calibrated in such a way that it performs like an average limb, abide being huge, and covered in steel and ceramic.

Firearm legume - Here ya go, have a skill list, my man/woman.

Energy Weapons - 100

Explosives - 75

Guns - 100

Melee Weapons - 50

Unarmed - 25

Barter - 100

Lockpick - 100

Medicine - 100

Repair - 75

Science - 80

Sneak - 50

Speech - 75

Survival - 100

He isn't gonna bee super overpowered in every category, only in some, I don't want him to massacre everyone, he'll get knocked down a peg himself at some point, however, when is for me to know, and you to find out. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)


	14. Chapter 13

The Ghosts of a Wanderer Chapter 13

Ruby's vision was red.

Only one thing was going through her adrenaline riddled mind at that moment, and that was that this strange man in black armor just murdered a Guardsman in cold blood.

Behind him, Ruby saw the camera screens were all black, seemingly turned off.

Alarms blared in Ruby's mind, her body acted on instinct and used her semblance to bolt to her left behind a heavy metal cabinet. The soft patting of an EXTREAMLY expensive silencer and the sound of bullets colliding with her cover were the only thing that reached her ears.

The firing stopped for a moment, and Ruby acted on instinct again, bolting from cover and extending Crescent Rose into its full scythe form.

She didn't have a chance to think before the large crescent blade flew towards the lightly armored man, or when the razor sharp blade ripped into the man's unprotected neck, nor did she get a chance to think before his carotid artery was sliced open, causing blood to gush out of his now open neck and onto her face.

Only after the blade penetrated the strange man's neck did she realize what she did, and dropped her weapon, her eyes wide and a large blotch of blood on her face, Ruby watched in horror as the man's hands bolted to his neck, his eyes wide in fear as his life force flowed freely from his body.

He collapsed to his knees, and then onto his chest, lifeless.

Ruby didn't know how long she spent just staring at the man's unmoving body, nor did she care, all she could think as that she had killed someone.

Sure he had been actively trying to kill her as well, but that didn't do anything to lessen the weight she felt crash down on her shoulders.

Ruby was shocked out of her stupor by the sound of heavy footfalls in the hallway.

With a flare of Ruby's semblance, Ruby was hidden neatly behind another metal cabinet in the far back of the room and out of imidate sight.

Ruby peaked around the corner of the cabinet right as a pair of people materialized out of thin air while entering the room, strange black blocky rifles going over every visible corner of the room but somehow missing her.

The two people were dressed exactly the same as the man who had attacked her.

Pitch black armor plates over an equally black undersuit. their strange rifles had what looked like a large rectangular silencer, and they looked like the would be better suited replacing the arm of an Atlas Knights than in the hands of what Ruby assumed were infiltrators.

That then brought something disturbing to the forefront of Ruby's mind.

Why were there infiltrators breaking into Beacon Academy in the first place? It just a school, right? What did they hope to accomplish?

Ruby peaked around the corner of the cabinet again and saw the two people pick up the man she had killed and disappear into thin air again, nothing but a shimmer in the air left to see.

Ruby focused on the shimmers and watched as they slowly moved out of the room.

Ruby used her semblance again and peaked her head carefully out the same door the strange men left a just a few seconds before. It took Ruby a second to find the distortions in the air again, but as soon as she did, they rounded a corner and disappeared again.

She continued following the infiltrators throughout the school grounds, a few scares here in there either because she thought she lost her targets or because she thought they saw her.

She followed them for another five minutes before she realized where they were going.

The student garage.

Of course, she knew that was where they were going because they were taking almost the same round she did when she went there to repair and repaint James's armor.

There was no way she would be able to take on both guys at the same time, especially when they had the ability to disappear into thin air. She could barely see them when focusing all of her energy on just looking, she would lose track of them in a second if she had to fight them.

With minimal options, Ruby decided on what she thought was her best course of action.

To go and find James, so that he could deal with the people trying to steal his armor. Ruby shuddered at the thought of remembering what happened to her when she had tried to inspect his sidearm during hand-to-hand-training class.

Ruby poured as much Aura into her Semblance as possible in order to warm James before it was too late, and with a flash of red, Ruby was off to find James faster than a drug dealer fleeing from the police.

James's Room

James was sleeping.

Really when I say sleeping I mean he was laying on his couch with bloodshot eyes, moaning in eternal alcohol poisoning induced pain, his artificial organs working overtime to detoxify his blood and get him back to one hundred and ten percent.

"Ughh, Just kill me now and get it over will." James moaned to himself, no matter what happened, he always hated having to recover from a drinking spree, but no matter how bad it was, James never stopped, I guess you could say he kinda maybe had an alcohol problem.

"Ok." A dark and raspy voice responded, James sighed in relief at the Answer before his eyes bolted open and he jumped out of his couch as a fully charged 2mm EC cartridge ripped a hole the size of his fist where he once lay groveling in pain.

Even after James poisoned it, his gut was always on his side.

James didn't even think as he rolled from what was about to be his grave, and dematerialized his .45 with a flash of blue, and brought it up in a snap, James let off four rounds before he leapt to the right, and into his kitchenette, as another 2mm EC round made contact his TV, causing a small shower of sparks.

He stayed still for a second before he heard the tell tail sound of heavy boots on the hardwood. James peeked out of his cover and saw what looked to be a pair of men sweeping his room with military efficiency he hadn't seen in a long time, the muzzles of their heavily modified, silenced, Gauss Rifles going over seemingly every corner before he leaned out of cover and fired three round into each of the two men, two in the chest, and one in the head.

The Wanderer shifted back into the relative safety of his cover before closing his eyes and focusing his ears on listening for footsteps, they strained for any sound that might be present in the room.

James knew a professional when he saw one, and if these guys were professionals, they would have one guy with a stealth boy waiting outside as a lookout, and like clockwork, James heard the faintest of footsteps as a shimmer made its way into James's abode.

Peeking around the corner of his bar, James spied the faint appearance of footsteps in the blood pooling around the two people he shot earlier, along with small chunks of brain matter begin crushed under the uncaring invisible boot of their buddy.

James looked around his kitchen for something to level the playing field from 'Invisible guy murders professor in less than a second' to a more interesting headline of 'Professor rips out attempted murderer's skull and beats him to death with it'.

Opening one of the lower cabinets that he was previously leaning on, James withdrew a bag of flour, He was going to throw the flour into the general direction of the hidden assailant, and use their new found visibility against them in in brutal bullet on skull combat.

After running over the plan in his head, James threw the bag of the flour into the air, focusing on it with all his might as he activated V.A.T.S.

James' face split into a maniacal grin as a concoction of adrenalin and other chemicals were pumped straight into his bloodstream thanks to his handy dandy Pip-Boy.

With James's reflexes heightened, he brought up his pistol and fired a single round into the bag of in-flight flour, blowing the bag in two and showering a large portion of the room a white powdery substance.

It took what felt like forever to James for the flour to finally settle onto the invisible form for the final infiltrator.

The man paused and whipped his head into the air, and then back down to his body, before the man had even thought to bring up his Gauss Rifle, he had already had four full metal jacketed lead slugs slam into his chest armor, causing him to stagger back before returning fire, forcing the Wanderer to crouch back behind his bar with a slur about heavier armor, reloading his empty magazine in the process.

"Fuck you, you Brotherhood scum!" The infiltrator yelled before he too took cover behind a wall to reload.

"Fuck you too fuck nugget!" James yelled back, hoping to play at his antagonist's emotions and make him do something drastically illogical, which the man did in the form of a head-on charge with one of the strongest Wasteland dwellers to ever live.

The man charged with all of his might, leaving his gun behind like and idiot, only to be close lined by James who had in the process of distracting his opponent, had moved up in order to get the jump on the infiltrator, his nose now broken and his pride burned to the ground like a sacked caravan, the man stayed where he laid, accepting his fate with Enclave pride.

James, the happy and accepting man he was, fired three rounds from his fresh magazine into the offending man's head, causing gray matter and blood to start leaking onto his floor for the second time that evening.

James was just about to start looting the bodies when one crucial piece of information came to his attention.

Ruby was standing in his doorway staring at him.

James's eyes bolted from his handgun to the infiltrator, to Ruby, and then back to the handgun before he took in a deep breath and spoke out one word in a defeated tone.

"Motherfucker."

A/N

Ayyy, Cliffhanger part Zwi kiddos.

Well, would you look at that, a chapter out in a more or less a week for three updates in a row? Wow, what am I getting my life on track or something?

Now for a couple of Guest reviews!

Guest (chapter 13) - I thought that the Enclave if they ever found Remnant would try to befriend the Human Remnants due to them not being radiated and their genes being pure human. I guess I was wrong.

(Answer) - One of the qualities I think of when thinking about the enclave is Corruption, So I like to think at if the Enclave were to find a batch of pure humans with Aura and Semblance, they would want to study it, and try and implement it into the FEV somehow.

Being as prideful as they were, they would probably label Remnant's humans and 'Not pure' and attempt an extermination at some point.

A fan (chapter 13) - Ok, I don't care about anything right now but what I do care about is when we will see Edgar you know the one in the hole preferably make Edgar a famous besides that meh.

(Answer) - To be honest, I have no Idea what or who Edgar is. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

I wanna say again, thank you all, my faithful readers, I may not be the best author here on fanfiction, but I love what I do and won't is quitting anytime soon!

Also, I've decided that I'm gonna change the official pairing from James/Velvet to James/?.

I'm doing so because if I were to keep on this path of writing with Velvet than I'm going to make a critical mistake and write myself into a corner.

I'm not gonna abandon this story no matter what, I'm about as dedicated to this story as I am my Girlfriend in real life XD

Anyways, I love you all, and I hope to see you guys in the next chapter of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer'!


	15. Chapter 14

The Ghosts of a Wanderer Chapter 14

Ruby was halfway down the hallway leading to James's room before the sound reached her ears stopping her dead in her tracks.

Gunfire.

Ruby bolted into a sprint again as the gunfire continued in pockets before it stopped altogether.

By then she was just outside of his dorm, the door was wide open.

Ruby crinkled her nose as a strange metallic smell reached her, it smelled almost identical to what the Guardroom smelled like when she had stumbled upon the strange infiltrate and his victim.

Panic filled Ruby as her mind began to run wild at the possibilities for the strange smell in the air before she spied what looked like one of the infiltrators hiding behind a wall and reloading one of those strangely huge rifles before leaning from cover slightly and yelling out.

"Fuck you, you Brotherhood scum!" The black-clad man yelled.

Ruby was extremely confused for a moment before another voice, this one recognizable, cut through the air like a hot, authoritative knife through butter.

"Fuck you too fuck nugget!"

Ruby let out a sigh of relief before her worry flowed through her again with renewed vigor if James was still alive than that meant that the other man here was trying to kill him.

She hesitated for a moment, the image of a man staring into her eyes resurfacing for the first time for a little while, her previous objective of following the infiltrators and warning James having kept the memories suppressed for a time, But before Ruby could push through her fear and help her friend, the man dropped his gun and rushed deeper into the apartment.

Ruby followed him almost instantly, rounding the corner in worry at just the right time to watch James close line the man and fire three, point blank rounds into the head of the infiltrator, blowing blood-soaked gray matter all over the ground, the back half of the man's head almost completely gone.

Ruby looked away from the now deceased man and looked at James.

She had wished she hadn't.

James looked like he was almost bored, his normally bright blue eyes were now a dull blue, his movements were brutal and efficient, and he showed no remorse for killing.

It scared her.

A moment later, James looked up at her, his eyes back to their normal blue, his handgun was gone like it did often in class or when she tried to get her hands on it when he wasn't looking.

"Motherfucker." James said in his normal everyday voice of exasperation that all of his students have gotten used too.

Ruby couldn't believe he was being so calm, it was unnerving how relaxed and casual James was acting, his foot was tapping to an unheard beat and his hands were in his pockets, shoulders slumped as if he hadn't just been attacked by a bunch of invisible men in the middle of the night.

Ruby stopped and then began to think, If James was this calm at a break in, then it can't be his first time dealing with something like this, it's the only thing to explain why he was so relaxed.

"You need to leave, I've got some things I need to do." James said, breaking Ruby from her stupor as she was pushed out of his dorm, the door slammed behind her, essentially cutting her off from the answers she so desperately needed.

She needed to find Ozpin.

-James's Dorm-

James gave out a sigh in relief at his quick thinking, sure shoving Ruby out of his room and leaving her with no answer to the millions of questions she probably had wasn't the best idea he had ever had, but it would have to work for the time being.

Locking the door, and walking back into his destroyed room, James began to search for the answers to his own questions via his best talent.

Looting the dead for anything and everything valuable.

Sure it wasn't exactly the most respectful thing to do after murdering them, but it's kinda their own fault, if they had just not attacked them, he wouldn't need to line his pockets with their positions.

The first body James searched was the one he had killed last, the man's armor was still covered in a light layer of flour, and his head didn't even look like a head.

The man's vest had quite a number of 2mm EM Cartridges, a radio, and a notepad.

James threw everything in a pile in the middle of his coffee table and began to strip the man of his armor.

As he started to flip the man over in order to unlatch his chest piece, James brushed away a bit of flour, revealing something that made James's heart skip a beat.

And not in the good, 'Oh that hot girl smiled at me', no it was more of the 'oh shit I just got shot' type of heart skip.

Painted, right there on the chest piece was the symbol for the one faction James hated more than anything.

It was the filthy, brahmin fucking Enclave.

"Fucking fuck fuckity fuck fuck FUCK." James yelled in rage while standing up and kicking the deceased man as hard as he could, flinging him down the hallway and into the door.

"How the FUCK are the Enclave back in business, they should be fucking gone!" James said to himself, pacing through his room and kicking the dead bodies whenever he came to them.

*Knock Knock Knock*

James's heavy gaze fell onto his front door, the EXTREAMLY dead Enclave infiltrator still slumped against it.

With a heavy sigh and a rub of his temples, James made his way to the door and opened it, the body in clear view of whoever had knocked.

There stood two of the three teachers James had actually talked to during his time teaching.

Glynda Goodwitch, and Bartholomew Oobleck, the latter being someone he even felt like he could trust on a sort of level after having an extremely in-depth conversation on military doctrine and morality.

Both of their eyes trailed down from James's eyes to the dead body slumped at his feet in an almost comically funny way.

If he thought he could get away with it, he would have laughed.

James just pushed the body behind the door with his foot and opened the door, gesturing for them to come in.

"I'll explain as soon as we are away from prying ears."

Both Oobleck and Goodwitch threw an uncomfortable glance at each other before hesitantly entering.

James closed the door behind them and locked it before leading the two professors to his living room turned battlefield.

"Before you start accusing me of murder, I would like to point out that these people tried to kill me," James said in a matter of factly tone, his hands crossed over his chest and a dead serious frown on his face.

"Why did they try and kill you?" Oobleck asked, inspecting the dead men with both intrigue and disgust, "They look to be quite well outfitted as well, I've never seen gear quite like this before."

James walked into the hallway and returned shortly with the chest piece he had been looking to scavenge before his epiphany.

"These people are from an organization called the Enclave, I've fought them before, and they're more dangerous than you can even imagine," James said, pointing out the enclave symbol to his colleagues.

"The Enclave?" Glynda asked, "I have never heard that name before."

"They were founded by a group of important politicians and industry leaders before the great war, I've been fighting them since I left Vault 101," James explained quickly, speaking words Glynda just didn't understand.

"What are you talking about James?" Glynda asked, her face distorted in confusion. "What is a Vault?"

James paused as he looked at Glynda like she had grown a third leg and began a three-legged gig.

"You know, crazy Vault Tech things, created to save the populace from the bombs?" James exclaimed, his arms opening wide and swinging open as if he had been wrestling with an invisible bear.

"James, How do you know of any of that, the only people here who should know of it are me and Ozpin," Oobleck said, his face an uncharacteristic frown with an undertone of suspicion.

"How do I know about the single most devastating thing on the entire motherfucking planet?" James said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I'm from a fucking vault dip shit, Why the fuck else would the Enclave hate me so much unless I was one of their failed science experiments?"

Oobleck paused, his back to James as he had been inspecting one of the other corpses in the room after James had called him a 'dip shit'.

Slowly, like a door being opened by a frightened child in a haunted house, Oobleck turned around to look ar James with a look neither James nor Glynda ever thought they would see on the old veteran hunter.

A look of fear.

Eyes wide and sweat beading, Oobleck grabbed James's shoulders and shook him with the speed of a cheetah on cocaine before speaking in a hurried manner.

"Are you telling me that these infiltrators are aligned with the 'Iron Men?" he asked, his eyes never staying in one place for too long, his cool had clearly been lost and wasn't gonna be getting it back unless he took a serious chill pill.

And by chill pill, I really mean a knock on the back of the neck.

James laid his hand out flat and struck Oobleck's neck while yelling out 'Knife hand', causing the caffeinated professor to fall to the ground.

He had seen that move in a holo-vid before had always thought it was bullshit until he had tried it out for shits and giggles on a friend, literally causing the woman to shit herself and go unconscious.

To say he giggled afterward would be an understatement.

"James, WHY did you attack The professor!? Glynda yelled, her hand moving to defend herself before James bowed and spoke.

"Miss Goodwitch! It was the Professor in the bedroom with the candlestick!" James said, his finger pointed upwards as if he had just solved some sort of mystery involving various random people and weapons being locked in a mansion on a dark and scary night.

Glynda didn't understand why, but for some reason, the image of a tall and lanky black-haired butler with a creepy bulging eyes and bow tie came to mind, she didn't have a Clue why.

Shaking herself out of her internal imagination, Glynda got back on track with the strange occurrences of the past evening, but before she could question the young man again, he began to question her.

"Please answer me this Glynda, who the flying fuck are the 'Iron Men', Glynda sighed and found that his voice held no room for argument or anything that wasn't the answer to his question really.

"The 'Iron Men' are a strange group of people who have been around for as long as anyone can remember, they've been operating in the shadows for quite some time, some Veteran hunters had said that they have seen the 'Iron Men' but the stories were so outlandish that no one ever believed them, they were always stories told to children to keep them in line." She said, her voice flat as if she had been saying something everyone on the planet knew but didn't really understand.

"Fucking great, the Enclave have you fuck nuggets wrapped around their finger like a wedding ring, only this time I'm gonna need a lot more than a set of bolt cutters to get you guys of that finger.

"James are you implying-" Glynda began, her face a look of anger and shock before James's finger met her lips with a long 'shhh'

"Not my best moment Glynda, Not my best moment," James said with a clearly fake sniffle and his face down before he jumped up and resumed searching the second dead corpses, humming a disappointingly happy tune for the desecration of a deceased man.

"Dude, Jackpot!" James yelled, his hands holding two objects in both of his hands above his head for Glynda to see, the first object looked to be a

small wallet, and the second, a folder.

She had no idea where James had found the folder, seeing as to the corpse had nowhere to store a folder on him, but she didn't have the brain power to waste on stupid questions that she REALLY didn't want the answers to.

She just needed to wait until Ozpin could take control of the situation so she could go back to bed, and get an actual good night's rest.

Glynda's train of thought was halted as a screech cut through the cool evening air, no doubt waking up everyone who hadn't been by the gunfire.

Glynda was about to ask if James had had anything to do with the scream, but when she turned to look at him, he was gone, and his door was slowly closing.

"Are you fucking kidding my" Glynda said, picking up a stray bottle off of James's bar and chugging half of it in one go.

"I'm getting way too fucking old for this shit."

A/N

Sup fuck nuggets, how you'll do?

Alright cool, I've got this chapter out a week late one, Because one, I'm a lazy fuck, and two because I was sick all last weekend, which just so happened to be my birthday weekend.

It fucking sucked.

Let's answer some guest reviews, shall we?

Guest (Chapter 1)

Great another story with an insane fallout character, because that is clearly not lazy writing to escape having to give and build character. Cuz bitch he does what he want! Well until that fine pussy comes around and he gets whipped into being a nice guy.

(Answer) Yes, I'm a lazy writer, but believe you me, we're gonna start getting into some more serious stuff pretty soon, only there will always be a joke here in there, it's just how I write.

Guest (Chapter 14)

Good job Ruby you just killed a post-apocalyptic nazi.

(Answer) Yup, good on you Rubes, don't worry, this totally won't come back to fuck you in the ass or anything. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡° )

Stuka (Chapter 14)

Will James get to be able to butt-fuck Velvet anytime soon? (Assuming rabbits actually like having a carrot stuck up their ass)

(Answer) Ahh, Stuka, how it's nice to hear from your vulgar mouth again. The thing with the romance is that the way I'm developing James is that he won't be a great match for Velvet, the relationship would be forced and far too difficult for an amateur like me to write, maybe someday I'll write an alternate ending where Velvet gets James, but for now the pairing will be a mystery.

Thank you all for favoriting, following, and reviewing, This story had now hit an absolute insane 25,000 views, I can't thank you all enough, and I hope to see you guys and gals here for the next chapter of 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer'.


	16. Re-Write Update

A/N

Sorry if ya'll got excited about this story being updated for the first time in about two years, but I'm here to tell ya not all hope is lost, I've grown exponentially as a writer in those two years and I look back on this story with a little more disappointed that I would like.

With that said, I'll be working on Re-Writing 'The Ghosts of a Wanderer' along with working on 'A New Kind of Warfare' and one other work in progress piece (It's a sort of Expanse inspired RWBY standalone story). I hope ya'll understand but this story is so riddled with plotholes, mistakes, and OOCs that it makes me cringe, I'll see if I can get the first chapter of the rewrite out by August 10t. I'd love to hear your feedback on the re-write, so leave a review on this chapter and I'll get back to you within the hour. My PMs are always open.

At any rate, I love you all, have a great day.


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